


can we skip to the good part?

by athena2049



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:33:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25908925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/athena2049/pseuds/athena2049
Summary: this is my first fic! it's been super fun to write, and it's quite wacky and random, hopefully it'll be super fun to read too. it's a les mis modern high school au and there are literally thirteen main characters... so yeah. ships aren't the main part of it, but yknow I do love the ships! also, the extent to which all of the ships listed above will, like, actually happen will probably vary. and Neopets (awesome online games-and-stuff website) is slightly involved but if you know nothing about Neopets it'll probably be fine.title is from the AJR song The Good Part, doesn't super specifically relate to the fic but I just love the vibe lmao
Relationships: Combeferre/Courfeyrac (Les Misérables), Cosette Fauchelevent/Marius Pontmercy, Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables), Joly/Bossuet Laigle/Musichetta, Montparnasse/Jean Prouvaire
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	1. Lemonade, Pep Rallies, and Neopets

**Author's Note:**

> welp, here goes nothing!

"All I'm saying is that high school is way more bearable when you bring something else in a water bottle besides water," argued Grantaire, pushing his hair out of his eyes. "It's just common sense."  


Eponine and Enjolras looked at him skeptically.  


"When you bring water, you gotta refill it at the water fountain. And all of the water fountains here are warm and dumb."  


With that, he took a long sip of lemonade. Leaning against an unused locker, Enjolras asked where he got his refills of lemonade at school. Grantaire simply pulled out another two empty reusable water bottles.  


"I can't believe none of them get too warm," Eponine said. She fiddled with the scrunchies around her wrists. "Is your backpack filled with ice packs or something?"  


"Maybe," he said. "Or maybe it's magic."  


Laughing (but only a little), Enjolras pointed out that they were gonna be late for math if they kept talking about this any longer. Grantaire and Eponine followed him to their next class, which would have been everyone's least favorite except for the fact that they shared it with the rest of their huge friend group.  


Combeferre, Jehan, Musichetta, Feuilly, Courfeyrac, Cosette, Marius, Bahorel, Bossuet, and Joly were in math with them too. And since it was kind of a small class, they were literally more than half of the students in there.  


It was chaos, and it was great.  


Their friend group had been going strong since middle school, hardly ever faltering except for that one disastrous game of dodgeball and the fight that followed it.  


With thirteen people who each had different schedules and responsibilities, it was sometimes difficult for everybody to get together, but they all tried their hardest.  


Everyone had their own unique role in the group:  


Enjolras was the most proactive, always pressing for a solution that would benefit everyone, carrying on even when better judgement would say to give up, and usually getting himself in trouble one way or another for this. He had a sweet, almost dorky charisma. Being too caught up on rules and technicalities was his biggest flaw, and he was _this_ close to being able to admit it.  


Combeferre never noticed when his glasses were smudged and dirty, because he was too busy noticing everything else--when moths landed on his windows at night, when one of his friends was uncomfortable or sad, when sunlight shown into a room and lit a spotlight on the dust in the air.  


Jehan, at any given time, had at least fifteen tabs opened on their sticker-covered laptop, most of which were usually the Wikipedia pages of their favorite cartoons. They were notorious for not understanding sarcasm and for choosing the weirdest, most hilarious clothing combinations ever. If their high school had a dress code, they would probably cry.  


Musichetta considered herself the only one in the group who could pull off plaid. All of her flannels were special, particularly the tattered ones, and she liked to think of each as representing some distinct part of her personality, her random and jumbled life. Not that she would tell anyone, but she did this with books too.  


Feuilly thrived under up-til-midnight, a-week-til-midterms conditions, to the point where he had accidentally turned himself into a procrastinator. Always taking the time to put in the extra effort his brain constantly nagged him about, and hardly putting himself first, he existed in a strange mishmash between stress and contentment. This paradox both amused and worried him, usually at the same time.  


Courfeyrac couldn't let a conversation go without finding something to laugh at, or make everyone else laugh at, or turn from unfunny to just weird. If he was overly dramatic or ridiculous, oh well; he moved around too quickly to gather much embarrassment. As far as nicknames went, he had more than enough saved up for everyone.  


Cosette loved learning things. Once she became attached to something, whether it was birds or Disney movies or music, it was hers forever. The only problem this had caused her was in spreading out her interests and talents in such a way that she didn't consider herself to truly excel at any one piece--and she had yet to figure out that that was perfectly fine.  


Marius didn't think it was normal for someone to eat so much hot sauce and eggs without getting sick of it, or stumble while climbing trees so much without giving up already, or watch so much Game of Thrones without understanding it at all. But he was an expert at doing things wrong while hardly being aware of it, which was honestly pretty entertaining for him and everybody else.  


Bahorel just wasn't one of those types of people who get excited about everything, with the three chief exceptions of math (when he understood it so perfectly that it actually became interesting), music (hip-hop and musicals, strangely, were his favorites), and getting to insult people who really deserved it. His jokes could be mean sometimes, but hey, what can you do?  


Bossuet's constant bad luck confounded, frustrated, amused, and even amazed him. What was wonderful about it, though, was that every incident of laptops dying at 50%, glasses of water spilling after he barely even did anything, and clothes tearing when he tried them on at the store, had taught him that nothing was as catastrophic as it seemed.  


Joly, when he was at his most confident, was totally different from Joly at his least confident. There was hardly an inbetween. He had a weird way of getting just as caught up in loving life and finding everything funny as he did in giving into his more nervous, hypochondriac tendencies.  


Eponine tackled her irresponsible and ruthless parents, her annoying yet lovable siblings, and her great yet taxing friends every single day. It got tiring. A lot. With so much on her plate, it was easy to lose her temper or say something stupid, but that's where being awesome at damage control comes in. And being able to forgive herself came in handy, too.  


Grantaire would probably object to some long, thoughtful paragraph about who he was and why he was complex. However, that didn't mean he didn't deserve one--it just meant he wasn't prone to digging into those things himself. He, for instance, wouldn't typically think about how his sarcasm, puns, and endearing annoyingness worked better than nearly anything to bring these thirteen teenagers together.

It was soon time for the first pep rally of the school year, so everyone came out of their classrooms and, in a crazy jumbled line, entered the gym. School spirit mixed with claustrophobia, but in a way that was actually cathartic and fun. And besides, if any of the friends had wanted to skip the pep rally and chill in the library instead, they'd miss seeing Cosette, Jehan, and Combeferre with the band, Feuilly with the swim team, Courfeyrac with the soccer team, and Musichetta with the dance team.  


The rest of them--Grantaire, Enjolras, Joly, Eponine, Bossuet, Marius, and Bahorel--went upstairs to the second level of bleachers, where 11th graders were supposed to sit.  


"Okay, I don't think we'll find a spot where all seven of us can sit right next to each other," guessed Enjolras, looking up at all the people who had gotten there before them.  


Everyone nodded. "Hopefully there's something close enough," said Marius.  


So the seven sat with three of them on one side of the steps going up the bleachers, and four on the other side. Bahorel squeezed onto the end of one seat because he was small, and Enjolras and Grantaire sat above him. Across from them were Marius, Eponine, Joly, and Bossuet, so tightly packed that they had to hold their backpacks in their laps. It was uncomfortable, but at least they all had a good view.  


Down below, a teacher was shouting things nobody could hear about how the pep rally would start in a couple minutes. Cosette, Jehan, and Combeferre were getting restless just standing and waiting, and so were Musichetta, Courfeyrac, and Feuilly, on their parts of the bleachers.  


"I wonder if the cheerleaders will go first, or if Chetta and the rest of the dance team will," Joly said to Bossuet. He fiddled nervously with all the strings and zippers on his backpack (crowds weren't his favorite).  


"What?" The music was already too loud for Bossuet to hear anything, naturally. "What's that?"  


Joly repeated what he said patiently.  


"Well, whoever goes first, I hope they turn the music down some," he complained.  


Eponine, who sat next to Joly, laughed. "Yeah, we don't want you to get hearing problems at 16! That'd be just your luck!"  


With a shrug, Bossuet grinned.  


Over on the other side of the steps, Bahorel was currently grumbling about being right next to Grantaire's apparently smelly feet. Grantaire brushed him off and drank some more lemonade instead of arguing, while Enjolras jokingly pretended to sniff his feet to see if Bahorel was right.  


Marius looked over at this and got pretty confused, but when he tried asking Grantaire what was going on, they couldn't hear each other at all. Thankfully, the pep rally was just about to start anyway.

The band began playing their school's fight song, which everyone knew Jehan had been struggling to learn.  


Combeferre seemed to be trying to refresh Jehan's memory of what to do with their oboe and play his flute at the same time. He ended up bumping into the girls next to him and making Cosette, who was a couple rows behind them toting a drum almost as big as herself, crack up laughing.  


Even from all the way up in the bleachers, Marius could have sworn that Cosette's laughter floated up to him. He caught her eye for a moment, before turning away and staring at his backpack for a while.  


It took Cosette a couple seconds to catch up to the beat again.  


Meanwhile, Jehan had gotten into a rhythm, copying the person next to them. Montparnasse noticed this but let it go. The two of them had a weird frenemies dynamic, with Jehan berating him for being snotty but still generally following him around and asking for help with playing the oboe. Combeferre and Cosette always thought this was amusing.  


When the song ended, everyone clapped and cheered. Next came the cheerleaders, and then more teachers saying stuff nobody could hear, and then Musichetta with the dance team. She wasn't wearing flannel, for once, but she was still grinning wider than ever.  


The music finally softened, to Bossuet's relief.  


By this time, Grantaire had regretfully finished his final bottle of lemonade. He complained about this to Bahorel and Enjolras, who thought of something.  


"Hey," he said, "so if you don't like the water fountains here, why can't you just fill all your bottles with cold water at home? It doesn't _have_ to be lemonade."  


Grantaire rolled his eyes. "I know it doesn't have to be lemonade, I just like lemonade, okay?"  


"Oh," said Enjolras. "Right. That makes sense."  


They sat in awkward silence for the rest of Musichetta's team's dance, when Bahorel made a joke about some teacher with a ridiculous outfit and the three of them laughed really loud.  


Now it was time for each sports team to walk across the "stage." Swim team went first, and as Feuilly and his teammates went past the band kids, he got a high five from nearly everyone in the front row. (Everybody loved Feuilly.) The football and volleyball teams went next, followed by soccer. Courfeyrac, to make the most out of his time out there, spun around in a circle while walking and waving to everyone he needed to wave to.  


After twenty more minutes of stuff like this, the band kids were getting really tired of standing, and the pep rally had ended.  


Musichetta, Combeferre, Cosette, and Jehan went to the locker rooms, to drop instruments off and/or change back into normal clothes. The seven sitting in the bleachers made their way down to the gym floor, following one embarrassing incident where Enjolras bumped into Grantaire, sending his backpack tumbling down the steps and nearly hitting a 9th grader. When they all got to the little hallway near the locker rooms, Feuilly and Courfeyrac were already waiting.  


"Hey, guys," said Feuilly, with a big smile. "Fun pep rally, huh?"  


His friends nodded, and Bahorel joked, "Good job making yourself dizzy waving to everybody, Courf. I think a yearbook photographer caught it, too."  


Embarrassed, Courfeyrac crossed his arms and was about to say something--probably something suitably dramatic and ridiculous--when Cosette, Jehan, Musichetta, and Combeferre all came out of the locker rooms. He broke off to congratulate them on how good they did in the pep rally, and then everyone else did the same.  


"Aww, thanks," Cosette said, quickly undoing her ponytail. "But we have something more important to talk about: we're going to my house to hang out. Jehan's never played Neopets before!"  


"Is it really that big of a deal?" they wondered. "I mean, have all of you played Neopets?"  


Most of them had, but Joly, Feuilly, Courfeyrac, and Bossuet hadn't, to Cosette's shock. The thirteen of them had already been planning to hang out at Cosette's house, because it was the closest to the school. Now, with her plan to introduce Jehan and the others to her favorite online game, they began heading over there.  


Her dad, Valjean, was used to hosting his daughter's friends several times a month. It was hectic with everyone running around, but either he never really minded, or he did a great job of hiding it.  


Grantaire and Courfeyrac liked to joke that Valjean wasn't just Cosette's adoptive dad, he was everybody else's dad too.  


As everyone passed under the live oaks lining one side of the sidewalk to Cosette's front door, Spanish moss bumped most of them in the face. It was a very nice yard--lots of trees, lots of flowers and berry bushes, really homey.  


Was it lame for Cosette's own front yard to be her favorite place in the world? Maybe, but she wouldn't dwell on that.  


"Hey, Dad," she called, "I'm… we're home!"  


Valjean, drinking from a tall mug of green tea, said hello to everybody. Everybody said hello back.  


Soon they were in the living room, all looking at the computer. "Okay, how is this going to work?" asked Musichetta, crossing her arms. "Going on the computer isn't really the best group activity ever…"  


She was right, of course, but Cosette didn't want to give up so easily, and Jehan was getting super curious about Neopets at this point, too.  


"Could we just get a bunch of chairs over here and watch?" suggested Courfeyrac.  


Combeferre agreed. "That's better than nothing."  


Finally, Enjolras and Feuilly came up with a solution that seemed, in retrospect, ridiculously simple. Nobody needed to play Neopets with Cosette if they didn't feel like it; sure, these thirteen friends loved hanging out as one whole group, but they weren't codependent. Luckily, no one felt particularly weird about making themselves at home here.  


Cosette excitedly launched into explaining Neopets--all the different worlds you could go to; all the Neopets and petpets and even petpetpets; and all the ways to interact with other players--to her five friends who were completely new to it, as well as Musichetta and Marius.  


"Neomail?" Joly asked at one point. "So this website has its own emailing thing? That's pretty cool."  


"It is, though," Cosette agreed, buzzing with happiness at getting to share this thing she loved with her best friends. The way she smiled made Marius smile; and, as everyone in this house did whatever they were doing, they all felt like it had been a pretty great day.


	2. Saturdays at the Library

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang goes to the library for a study session, and various random incidents ensue. Gnomes are involved.

A thirteen-person table was hard to come by at the public library, but through good luck (plus Eponine and Enjolras convincing a few people to move) they had found one. It was perfect for their morning study session, and was soon covered in papers, laptops, and the fruit snacks Feuilly had brought for everyone to share.

"I have to go to the bathroom," Bossuet announced, right when he sat down.

Musichetta raised an eyebrow. "Already?"

He shrugged, getting up to try and find the bathrooms. On the other side of the table, Eponine, Bahorel, and Joly were setting up their workspace. This past week, they'd been assigned to do a book report together on To Kill a Mockingbird. With Bahorel's off-topic jokes, Eponine's grumbles about what slides to use on PowerPoint, and Joly's typically ignored attempts at mediating, it was definitely going to be a long morning.

"The font doesn't matter," argued Bahorel. "Neither does the color, or the background, or the transitions! That's not what we're actually doing the book report on."

In response, Eponine flicked her purple scrunchie at him and cracked up laughing. Joly just sighed.

Marius passed Cosette the rest of his fruit snacks, and they exchanged a look. "Hey, guys," he said, "I think you have plenty of time to focus on the actual stuff and the PowerPoint stuff."

"He's right," Eponine told Bahorel pointedly. "Thanks, Marius."

After this, they all quieted down for a while, with everyone getting settled into doing their own thing. Combeferre, particularly, was super invested in his essay for a scholarship that was due this coming Monday. He was excited to finally finish it, and hoped that none of his friends would distract him too much.

Unfortunately for him, though, Courfeyrac was already trying to be a distraction.

Mainly out of being bored, he was telling him a bunch of lame Harry Potter puns that Combeferre pretended to not find hilarious. While Courfeyrac knew that his friend's essay was important, he also knew that Combeferre had been stressed over it recently, so maybe this would cheer him up instead of annoying him. Hopefully.

But Bahorel and Eponine weren't helping, and neither was Jehan, who was trying to write fanfiction instead of doing work. They wanted advice from Combeferre, because he was a generally good writer. But after a few vague pieces of advice, Jehan got the message and instead chatted with Cosette.

"I don't get it," she said, scanning a few paragraphs. "Are you _trying_ to make it sound like poetry? Because I've never really heard of fanfiction poetry."

"It could happen," they insisted. "I could make my own genre!"

When Grantaire asked Combeferre if he felt like helping him search the library for a book he'd recommended, he was shot down quickly. So Grantaire asked if anyone else wanted to go with him, because he really didn't feel like doing work right now.

Putting down his fruit snacks, Enjolras wondered, "Why can't you go by yourself?"

"Y'know, the lemonade reason."

"What?"

Everyone else was similarly confused, and they still were when Grantaire explained that it wasn't something he absolutely needed to do, he just felt like having it this way. But Enjolras got it, so he backed off. Grantaire gave him a little smile.

A moment passed. Enjolras looked down at his math homework, which glared back up at him. "Um, I'll go look for the book with you," he offered. At this, Grantaire simply shrugged.

Things began to settle down. The two of them headed off towards the YA section, Grantaire trying to remember the title of the book; Jehan kept writing fanfiction poetry about Gravity Falls; Musichetta complained to herself about how hard it was to write an essay introduction; Eponine and Bahorel listened to Joly analyze Scout and Atticus Finch before jumping in with their own takes; and Combeferre found himself staring at the patterns of the library ceiling instead of writing.

As usually happened when there was comfortable semi-silence, Marius couldn't tell it was comfortable and fought for something to say.

He bumped Cosette with his shoulder. "Hey, look at this--I can juggle fruit snacks!"

Marius actually could do this, which Cosette thought was awesome. She giggled, and Feuilly asked where he learned how to do that.

"Either my grandpa taught me, or it was during gym class one year, or I learned it from TV," he said, shaking his head. "I literally have no clue. Ridiculous, right?"

Feuilly laughed. "Well, even if you don't remember, it's still pretty cool." He munched on some fruit snacks, leafing through his giant chemistry vocab packet. It was a beast, but it wasn't going to complete itself.

"You don't know what the book's called?" Exasperated, Enjolras leaned back against the side of a long bookshelf. "I guess that's why you wanted Combeferre to come with you."

Grantaire apologetically nodded.

"Sorry, dude," he said. "But I don't feel like going back and asking him--he seems kinda stressed about that essay thing."

"He does," Enjolras agreed. With a hint of awkwardness, they each looked around at the library, all the rows and rows of books in every genre. "Well… I don't feel like returning to my work yet, and I'm guessing you don't either."

So they decided to walk around, which was half nice and half weird. Grantaire and Enjolras didn't usually hang out on their own much, but in a thirteen-person group many of them could say that. Either way, there was a pleasant quiet to this part of the library.

The back area looked pretty abandoned and dusty, with nothing but a wooden table, a huge window looking outside, and a pathetic pile of magazines.

"Nice," said Grantaire, hopping up to sit on the table. After checking to make sure no one could see, Enjolras did the same.

There was a gazebo outside that they saw through the window, and also a crazy amount of… "Gnomes?" laughed Enjolras, incredulously. "Dude, there's a bunch of gnomes on the ground in this place's backyard! That's hilarious."

Indeed there were. While they laughed--probably too loudly for being in a library--Grantaire counted the gnomes, and he guessed that there were about thirty of them. And it was a small space, too. It was just gnomes and the gazebo and then woods.

Enjolras hugged his stomach, which was sore from laughing so much. "It's not like there's even a gnome theme in the actual library," he said. "Then it would kind of make sense."

"Do you think someone just dumped them here?" Grantaire wondered. "I mean… there's no good explanation."

Feeling restless, he laid down on the table, craning his head to look at the books behind him. Enjolras glanced at him curiously. "Oh cool, there's art books over there."

"You like art?" Enjolras asked.

"Haven't I mentioned that before?... Okay, maybe not to you, but I know I've told Cosette and Eponine." Thinking this was a good idea, Grantaire tried to gracefully roll off the table and land on his feet. Instead, he flopped and thunked. "Ow. I'm alright. Probably got some bruises, but alright."

Batting his embarrassment away, Grantaire got up and perused the art books.

Enjolras smirked. "Wow," he said. "That was so impressive."

"Shut up! Do you want me to throw this painting manual at you?"

Meanwhile, Bossuet had been gone for almost thirty minutes. What had happened what this: the door to the library bathrooms was one of those stupid ones that give some resistance and make it seem like they're locked. So he assumed someone was in there… and kept assuming… and after about ten minutes, he finally tried the door again. Nobody was in there after all.

"I make it so easy, don't I?" he muttered to himself, with a laugh. "Musichetta and Joly are never gonna let me live this down."

But things didn't get any better when he actually went to the bathroom.

For the first time in Bossuet's life, he had a toilet overflow onto him. The water only touched his shoes for a moment before he freaked out and jumped away, wondering what to do now. Like always, he kept a good sense of humor about it, but… what the heck?

Grabbing paper towels, he wondered if this happened often. And if he'd be able to find a janitor to tell about it.

Bossuet dried up the spill for a while, which was honestly quite a considerate thing to do for a bathroom that wasn't even his, before deciding that a janitor was desperately needed. Making sure his shoes were fully dry, he (finally) left.

Things were slowly becoming more hectic over at the main table. Marius, Feuilly, and Musichetta had decided to take a break from their work and go for a nostalgia run through the children's section, leaving just Combeferre, Jehan, Cosette, Eponine, Bahorel, Joly, and Courfeyrac. Everyone wondered a few times why Bossuet was taking so long.

"How long even is this book report?" asked Cosette at one point, breaking up an argument about the most major themes of To Kill a Mockingbird. "Seems like you guys have been doing it forever."

Joly counted on his fingers, and said, "Well, it only has to be fourteen slides or so, but yeah, it's pretty much been an entire eternity."

Finally realizing that they had been inconsiderate, Eponine and Bahorel shared a look.

"Sorry about being annoying," she told Joly.

Bahorel added, "Yeah, man. Our bad."

He smiled, and that was that.

Courfeyrac tossed a few fruit snacks into his mouth and asked Combeferre how his essay was going. "Pretty well," he answered. "But I wish I could make myself focus on it, like, completely. My brain just wanders when I hear people talking."

"Yeah, I get that," Courfeyrac said, nodding. "So you can't tune it out?"

"Nah, not really. I dunno why."

Around this time, Jehan had reached a tricky point in their fanfiction. Combeferre would probably know what made sense, but talk about bad timing when he was just saying how he couldn't focus. Not knowing what to do, they rocked back and forth in their chair, unconsciously making a little humming noise.

"What'cha humming?" asked Courfeyrac.

"Oh, nothing."

But that clearly wasn't the case, so Courfeyrac kept pressing, to the point where it became a game and they started chasing each other around the table. This was hilarious, and the other people sitting near them had left, so it was totally fine.

Combeferre knew it was fine, but he still groaned and said, "Hey, guys, could you be quiet?"

Courfeyrac knew he was stressed, but he still said, "Hey, we're just having fun! This was actually supposed to be a fun study session, y'know."

The other people at the table grew silent, watching this happen. Jehan stepped forward, without something to say.

Adjusting his glasses, Combeferre said, "Courf, I get it--oh!"

In his frustration, he'd broken his glasses. Broken them!

"Shit," he muttered. "How did I just do that?"

Everyone shrugged, exactly as confused as he was. Strangely enough, a wave of relief washed over them: Courfeyrac and Combeferre started laughing, followed by everybody else. He was upset about his glasses, but how often does something like this happen? Breaking your own glasses because you're having an argument? Pretty darn funny.

"Poor glasses," joked Courfeyrac, picking them up gently and examining the broken arm. "I think I have some tape in my bag, so you can at least wear them for now."

"Thanks." Combeferre watched him temporarily fix the glasses, a little lump in his throat. "Sorry for overreacting."

With a grin, he handed them over. "No problem."

"I used to read these books when I was in, like, third grade," Musichetta gushed, picking up a copy of Ruby the Red Fairy and beaming at it. "And I actually used to have this one."

"What happened to it?" asked Feuilly.

She shrugged, putting the book back and running her hand along all the others in the Rainbow Fairies Series. "My sister and I got in a fight, and she kinda accidentally tore the cover off. Then my parents wouldn't let me keep it."

Marius scanned the bookshelf next to him. While he didn't recognize any of the books, there was a stuffed dragon on top that looked exactly like one of his own. "Shoot, that must have been sad."

"Well, believe me, I made up for it with plenty of other books when they built that Barnes and Noble here."

The children's section of the library was the best part, in these three friends' opinions. Not only were there awesome nostalgic books, there were games and puzzles and even a place for kids to have puppet shows. All of this was too old for Feuilly, Musichetta, and Marius, though, so they just walked around wistfully.

"Hey, here's those Warrior Cats books. Cosette used to really love them," said Musichetta, watching closely for Marius' reaction. She smirked when he stiffened a little.

Marius saw the smirk. "Oh, cut it out, Chetta!"

"Not until you admit you like her," she insisted. "Come on, Marius, it's been so long since there's been fun drama!"

Groaning, Marius admitted it. Feuilly, who also liked the Warrior Cats series and had been searching for one he hadn't read before, gave Musichetta a high five. This annoyed Marius.

"Okay, so what was the point of that? You clearly already knew I liked her."

"I don't know," she said. "Does there have to be a point to everything?"

After this, they kept walking around, ignoring the looks from the librarian at the counter. Right before they were about to leave and go back to their friends, Bossuet showed up.

"Hey, guys," he said cheerfully. "You will not believe how complicated a simple trip to the bathroom became."

Marius, Feuilly, and Musichetta's eyes widened as they listened to Bossuet recount his harrowing journey. "And there's no janitors in this place, apparently," he finished. "Isn't that dumb?"

"Very dumb," Musichetta agreed, laughing at his story. "Maybe you can ask the lady over there."

When Enjolras and Grantaire came back to the main table, everyone had already gotten back and exchanged stories (and made sure the bathroom was taken care of). Combeferre and Bossuet couldn't decide who had had a funnier, unluckier day. But everyone could agree that this had been an unforgettable study session.

"Joly, guess what?" Enjolras called. "Grantaire got himself sort of hurt--he can be your first patient!"

Excited, Joly came up and fished a few bandages out of his pockets, asking what had happened. Grantaire was quite confused but he recalled the whole falling-off-a-table incident for him anyway.

While this went on, Cosette nudged Marius to ask what he thought was going on. Marius explained that Joly's new thing was wanting to be a doctor, and Enjolras had agreed to help him out with this.

"Huh," she said. "Well, good for him, but bad for Grantaire."

In fact, Joly had already moved a bunch of papers and laptops off of one section of the table, asking for Grantaire to sit up there. He complied, sending Eponine a look that clearly said _what the heck_.

"You guys missed a lot," Bossuet told Enjolras. He and Combeferre filled him in, and then it was Enjolras' turn to tell them about all the gnomes.

As Joly slapped bandages on and rambled about ice packs and heating pads, Grantaire couldn't help letting his mind wander over to where Enjolras was laughing. He folded his hands in his lap, smiling to himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the things that happen to Bossuet have each happened to me, albeit not at once, and Combeferre breaking his glasses is sort of based on something that happened to me too. lmao!


	3. Swimming and Spying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Feuilly has a swim meet, and things get sorta odd afterwards.

"Come on, guys, it's the first swim meet of the school year," Feuilly complained, pouting. "I can't believe there's no band practice or dance practice or soccer practice, and still only three people aren't busy."

Everyone felt bad, but Eponine, Jehan, and Bahorel really were the only people who didn't have anything going on tonight.

The others had their reasons, which were: Musichetta had to babysit for a neighbor; Combeferre's older brother had a chess tournament over at the college; Enjolras needed to run errands with his mom; Marius and Cosette were getting some volunteer hours over at a local church, packaging meals for the homeless; Joly was stuck helping his siblings with homework while his moms had their date night; Bossuet was going out to Red Lobster with his parents; and both Courfeyrac and Grantaire were coming down with something, and needed to rest.

"I'll make the next one, I promise," Combeferre said with a smile.

"Yeah, I know." Feuilly pulled some fruit snacks out of his pocket. "Nice new glasses, by the way."

They really were, bright blue with no tape and certainly no broken arms. Courfeyrac had nicknamed them "Victim #2" and had been jokingly planning to hold a funeral for Victim #1 (Combeferre's old, broken glasses) before being told to shut up. Joly even offered to do an autopsy!

"And what are you guys doing, again?" Enjolras asked Cosette and Marius.

She said, "Valjean set it up a few weeks ago--it's at our church, putting meals together for homeless people. We're gonna get a bunch of volunteer hours."

Shielding his eyes from the sun, Grantaire slipped his backpack off his shoulders and leaned on it. They were all sitting on the bleachers in the football field after school, because everyone who could drive themselves home would carpool with those who couldn't. "So why could it only be you two doing this, and not more of us?"

He and Musichetta, who had been working together on this lately, shared a subtle high five.

Marius cleared his throat and stared down at his backpack for a while, and Cosette shook her head, trying not to seem defensive. "It's, well, they don't need that many people for it. There was just a small opening."

" _Right_ ," he said. But he shut up when Enjolras and Eponine both gave him a look.

To lighten the mood, Joly and Bossuet started telling everyone about their new Neopets accounts. Joly was especially happy about his username, jolllly123. They absolutely loved it--the games, the story behind everything, even all of the little cartoon food.

"Some of the food looks so good," Bossuet said, almost envious. Cosette nodded sympathetically.

She asked Jehan if they had been on Neopets again, and they had. "I really like it… hey Feuilly, could you toss me a fruit snack?"

With a nod, Feuilly tossed it over, and then Jehan tossed it into their mouth. Bahorel got one too. "Anyway, yeah, it's great."

"I'm so glad you guys liked it and didn't just think it was silly," said Cosette, curling some hair around her finger. "Means a lot to me."

Likewise, it meant a lot to Feuilly that three of his friends were coming to his first swim meet of the year. He would've wanted more of them to come, of course, but there was always next time.

The high school had a decently sized indoor swimming pool, with several rows of bleachers for people to sit on, and that's where Feuilly's swim meet took place. Eponine led Jehan and Bahorel onto an empty space on the highest bleacher, which she said was the best place to sit.

"What if we yell stuff to him and he can't hear us from up here?" Jehan pointed out, pulling their sweatpants up so they wouldn't drag on the dirty steps. But Eponine waved his question off and kept walking.

Bahorel gave Jehan a little shrug. "It's probably not high enough for that," he guessed. "And Eponine'll be plenty loud."

"Okay, I'm gonna do you a favor and let that go."

Jehan giggled, sitting down next to Eponine, who threateningly held her scrunchie towards Bahorel like she was gonna flick it at him. He grinned, ducking behind Jehan when he sat down. This made them all laugh.

Down below, the swim team was getting ready, and Feuilly kind of looked like a bug with his huge goggles. Jehan cheered to him, followed by Eponine and Bahorel. Feuilly sent back two thumbs up and a grin that was super clear, even from the highest bleacher.

"So what events are Feuilly in?" wondered Eponine. "It's not all of them, right?"

"Right." Bahorel fished around in his pockets for his phone. "He texted me about it a while ago, lemme see what it says… okay, there's something about a medley relay, and a few different freestyle races. I don't know how many meters long this pool is, so this doesn't really help."

Around this time, someone Jehan knew from band had come up the bleachers and sat down near the three of them. It was Montparnasse.

This was a rather complicated situation for Jehan, who already had trouble knowing what to do in many less complicated circumstances. If they waved to Montparnasse, that would be like saying that the two of them were friends outside of band, something which had been unclear for a while. In fact, Jehan and Montparnasse weren't even friends _in_ band a lot of the time.

That was the issue with being frenemies, they supposed. Sometimes it was just impossible to not pick a side.

But all of their worrying seemed to be for nothing, as Montparnasse didn't even seem to notice them… at least until he turned around and said hi.

"Oh," they said, tugging on sweatpants. "Hey, Monty."

Bahorel and Eponine shared an amused look.

"Hey," echoed Montparnasse. "So where's the rest of your pack?"

"Well, Feuilly's down there." Jehan pointed to the pool, where everyone on the swim team was finishing their warm ups and the coach gave a pep talk. "But Combeferre and Cosette are both busy tonight, and I don't know if you know anyone else."

"I know Grantaire," Montparnasse said, shrugging and flopping his feet across the seat. "We had science together last year."

There was a lull in the conversation, before Jehan had the idea to introduce Eponine and Bahorel to Montparnasse.

Down below, the first freestyle race had started, but because it wasn't one of Feuilly's, the four of them kept talking. Apparently, Montparnasse was here because his twin sister Marie was in the swim team, too.

"A twin sister?" said Eponine, with a small smile. "My two youngest brothers are twins, cool."

"Yeah," Jehan mumbled, "I didn't know you had a twin."

Shrugging again, Montparnasse looked out at all the swimmers going across the pool in different strokes. "Why is it such a big deal? Get off my back."

This definitely irritated Eponine and Bahorel, who could both be protective of Jehan, just like everybody else in their huge friend group. But Jehan replied before either of them got the chance to.

"Monty, I don't appreciate your tone," they scolded. With a good-naturedly exaggerated sigh, Montparnasse apologized.

Soon, the first race was over. Feuilly's teammates climbed out of the pool, water splashing behind them and shining in the late afternoon sun that came through the windows. Bahorel accidentally kicked Montparnasse while clapping for the winner, but then it was fine when he got even by untying Bahorel's shoes.

The next swimmers, including Feuilly and Marie, got ready to get in the water. Jehan wished Montparnasse's sister good luck, and he wished their friend good luck.

By the time the meet had ended, Feuilly felt exhausted and exhilarated. Waving up at his friends, he told them to meet him near the locker rooms after he finished taking a shower and drying off.

Eponine, Bahorel, and Jehan had had fun too. There was hardly anything boring about the meet--Eponine only resorted to playing with her scrunchies once, and Bahorel managed to resist sprouting off jokes about the swim team members and references to his favorite songs. Even Jehan and Montparnasse found themselves chatting about a whole bunch of things.

"Okay," said Eponine, grabbing her stuff and standing up, "hopefully we'll be able to find that place."

Bahorel nodded, and Jehan glanced at Montparnasse.

"Do you wanna hang out with us?" they wondered. "Unless, uh, you need to go somewhere with Marie right now or something, or you just don't want to, or anything like that."

Nearly smiling, Montparnasse said he didn't really have anywhere to be and would want to hang out with them.

So the four of them made their way down the bleachers and over to the oddly large locker room/gym/janitorial building--Eponine and Bahorel questioning why Jehan had brought Montparnasse along, those two making awkward chit chat.

Turns out, giving a building that many functions inevitably made it super confusing. Because of the tight hallways, the unmarked rooms, and the fact that nobody had spent much time here before, it seemed impossible to find where Feuilly wanted them to go.

"This place is like a labyrinth," Montparnasse said to Jehan, shaking his head. "Ridiculous."

Jehan was just about to ask what a labyrinth was, when they heard people talking from a room up ahead. Very quickly, the four of them shushed and got into eavesdropping mode.

Someone said, "I know, he is kinda odd. At practice one time he was making a pyramid out of his fruit snacks."

Turning to Bahorel, Eponine mouthed _Feuilly?_

Worriedly, he shrugged.

Another teammate went on. "And Feuilly's always going on and on about geography and history and Poland. Like, who's obsessed with Poland?? Marie's the same way, y'know, just about all her clubs and stuff."

"Yeah, she totally is."

At this, Bahorel and Montparnasse were the angriest, with Eponine and Jehan close behind. Not wanting to listen to this anymore and needing somewhere they could talk privately, they all ran into a supply closet.

"Can you believe that?" whispered Bahorel, squeezing past a couple of brooms. "What's so weird about fruit snack pyramids and Poland?"

"And yeah," said Montparnasse in as quiet a voice as he could, "Marie is on the swim team and in culinary class and in art club, but that just makes her a well rounded person!"

Eponine nodded fiercely, standing snugly underneath a shelf. "Right! Do they even care about college applications?"

Within this bubble of frustration, Jehan was the only one trying to pop it. "Hey," they whispered, lightly placing a hand on Montparnasse's and Bahorel's shoulders, "what if it was out of context? Couldn't it be regular friendly teasing, and Feuilly and Marie were playing along with it, we just couldn't see?"

Montparnasse shook his head, jerking his shoulder away. "If Feuilly and Marie were there, those people would have been like 'you guys' instead of just saying their names."

"Plus we probably would have heard them say something," added Eponine.

Bahorel scowled. "And it wouldn't have been so darn rude."

"Okay, okay, forgive me for trying to calm you guys down, forget I said anything." Unable to pace, because of how tiny the closet was, Jehan settled for rocking side to side and humming. "I know they were just being mean. It's stupid and I don't like it. So what do we do?"

Nobody had an answer. For now, they had no clue if the people in the locker room would catch them if they left, and risking that wasn't smart.

With a little grin, Montparnasse turned to Jehan, leaving only a couple of cans of Clorox wipes between them. "Well... wanna talk about oboes?"

Only five minutes passed before the closet became unbearable, and consequences were set aside.

Thankfully, everyone could breathe again when they were back in the hallway, and they weren't immediately caught. But the problems of what to do about the people who were talking behind Feuilly and Marie's backs--not to mention how to get un-lost--still weren't solved.

Bahorel was fully prepared to go off on them, so Jehan and Eponine pushed him down the hallway in the opposite direction. If he got into a fight, that would overcomplicate everything.

"I can just figure out who they are," reasoned Eponine, "and at school we can tell them to stop being mean to our friends."

Montparnasse nodded his approval, but Jehan groaned.

"Guys, calm down. What if Feuilly and Marie don't want us to get involved in all this drama? And how are you even gonna find out who they are? There's like thirteen people on the swim team, Ponine."

They weren't used to being the voice of reason; this was getting frustrating. And their friends wouldn't budge.

"So they just get away with calling them weird?" Bahorel asked. "How's that fair?"

"I don't know! Okay? I have no idea!"

Looking back down the hallway, Montparnasse shushed the two of them. Eponine started walking faster, and so did Bahorel, visibly very frustrated. Hugging a wall, Jehan wiped away stupid arguing tears.

There was finally an exit door, out of which they left this labyrinth. Bahorel pulled out his phone and texted Feuilly about how lost they'd gotten.

Eponine, who was arguably even less used to being a mediator than Jehan was, looked around at her friends. (Yeah, she basically only met Montparnasse today, but getting stuck in a closet and bonding over being angry at mean people bridges the gap pretty well.)

"Okay, guys, I think we're all stressed out. We just need to calm down and forget about everything for a while," she said. "At least right now."

Everyone else agreed.

Soon Feuilly called, saying he was sorry for how confusing the locker room building was and also that Marie was coming with him, to get her brother.

When they got there, Jehan, Eponine, Bahorel, and Montparnasse spent a lot of time congratulating them on how well they'd done at the meet. Feuilly introduced Marie to his friends, and everyone laughed a little at the odd circumstances causing them to be hanging out in a random field at school when it was almost dinnertime.

Because they wanted to make it up to Bahorel for acting like they should let the whole thing go, Jehan was the one to tell Feuilly and Marie about the eavesdropping. Montparnasse stepped in helpfully when Jehan couldn't quite describe something.

"You guys heard people talking about us?" Feuilly asked, sharing a look with Marie. They were shocked… and then they just shrugged, leaving the others twice as shocked.

Eponine and Jehan each let out a confused laugh, and Montparnasse looked at his sister like she was crazy.

Naturally, Bahorel scowled again. "You don't care at all? We hid in a cramped closet for you guys… I bumped into like five brooms!"

"Oof," said Marie, sympathetically. "That sounds uncomfortable."

Running his hands through his damp hair, Feuilly said, "I get what you mean, man, but what's the point of being so angry about it? You didn't see who they were, we didn't hear them, and I'm not gonna act mean towards everyone on the swim team until I figure out who it was."

At this, Bahorel relented, and Jehan gave Eponine a pointed look that clearly said _told you so_. She rolled her eyes and laughed.

"I agree with Feuilly," Marie told Montparnasse, seeing that he was about to butt in.

"Okay," he said, "but obviously this changes if we do somehow figure out who it was. Right?"

Smiling at her brother's protectiveness, Marie nodded.

Jehan watched this, thinking about how different Montparnasse and Marie were. Going on this little adventure had changed their opinion of him, and as everybody strolled back to the school's parking lot, they elbowed him.

"Y'know, Monty, I think we're officially friends now," they remarked.

Montparnasse considered this. "Alright. Cool. Just no more hiding in tiny closets when we hang out, okay?"

"Sounds like a deal."


	4. Same Night, Continued

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hey, I'm back!! Its kinda been a while, but with school starting a few weeks ago there's way less time for me to upload these :/ oh well!
> 
> Anyway, this chapter is just the same night from chapter 3, but we show Marius and Cosette at their volunteering thing, plus Joly, Bossuet, and Musichetta texting while they all do their separate things. enjoy!
> 
> also, the texting isn't really formatted 100% how I would want it to be, but I couldn't figure out how to get all the texts from one of them to be on the other side (like how it is when you're actually looking at your own texts, not starting from the same side of the screen as other people's texts). does anyone know how to do that, by any chance?

While Feuilly's swim meet--and all of the craziness going on afterwards--took place, Valjean had dropped Cosette and Marius off at the church for their volunteering and said goodbye to both of them.

Pulling her dad in for a hug, Cosette said bye.

"Have fun," Valjean told the two of them, smiling warmly. "But not too much. You are here to work, after all."

"Alright, Mr. Fauchelevent."

"Alright, Dad."

With that, he got back into his old green SUV and started the drive home. Marius and Cosette tucked their community service hours sheets into their pockets, shared a smile, and walked inside the church. A lady who knew Valjean pretty well met them there, and led them to the room where they would be packaging meals.

"We have lots of food there already," she told them. "It's kind of like an assembly line, except you just go through it all yourself. That's what you guys will do for a while, until we need more food brought down, and then you can do that."

Absorbing all of this, they nodded.

Cosette pulled her hair into a bun, making sure no little strands were out, just like she did whenever she and Valjean would cook together. Right next to her, Marius took random papers and thingies out of his pockets and threw them into a nearby trash can.

"Okay, here we are." The lady smiled at all the other volunteers in this large room, already working on the meals. "Wash your hands, then you can start."

Heading over to the sink, Cosette and Marius chatted about stuff. "This place seems cool," he said, looking up at the super high ceiling and the one little stained glass window. "It's really great that your dad found out about tonight."

He stepped aside so Cosette could wash her hands first. "I know, right? I mean, it seems like school does nothing to bring up ideas for volunteer hours unless you're in a club for that."

"Yeah, seriously."

As she moved over a bit to grab a paper towel, Marius got some soap and water. It was a small sink. They were standing rather close to each other. And the moment didn't last long, but both of them still had tiny, secretive smiles after it was over.

Lots of kids their age, mid-to-late high school, were also volunteering. Cosette knew some of them, Marius knew less, and so they generally kept to themselves throughout the night.

A guy with awesomely curly blonde hair, around college age or so, handed them cardboard boxes for different meals to go into.

"Y'know," Marius whispered as they walked to the start of the food line, "he looks like Enjolras but like five years older."

"Whoa, you're right!" With a little laugh, Cosette set down her box and grabbed a label that said 'Main Dish Oatmeal'. "Wouldn't it be crazy if in five years we remember what he looks like and Enjolras actually does look like him?"

They both laughed a bunch at this, getting looks from other volunteers. Marius grabbed a spaghetti label for his box.

"And it'd be really crazy if there were a bunch of other people here who looked like older versions of our friends," he went on. "Maybe this is all legit for charity, it's just also an undercover thing for our clones to meet up!"

Giggling, Cosette scanned the people around her while picking snack foods up and also trying not to look too long and be weird. She gave Marius an exaggeratedly disappointed look.

"One girl kinda looks like Eponine, but that's it. I guess it's a no on the clones theory, then."

Remembering Valjean's instructions to focus on their work more than anything else, they settled into a rhythm of packaging meals. Each box had a main course, which would be heated up before being delivered, as well as several other snacks and drinks. It was important for everything to be relatively healthy, but Cosette and Marius made sure to put plenty of yummy stuff in their boxes, too.

Even though they had mainly wanted to do this for volunteer hours to help with scholarship requirements down the road, it felt really nice to do something like this. Something that would help people.

"Hey," he said after a while of no talking, "do you know if Jehan ever finished their Gravity Falls poetry fanfiction thing?"

Cosette grabbed a water bottle and a juice pack, trying to remember. "Well, I think they want to get all of it written before uploading. All _twenty_ chapters! It was something about not wanting fans to have to wait."

Laughing, Marius tossed a little cracker pack between his hands. "I can't believe they have twenty chapters' worth of poetry fanfiction… hmm, do you think I'd get in trouble for juggling these?"

"Totally," she joked. "And then Valjean wouldn't let you do volunteer-y stuff with me anymore! That would suck."

Marius floofed his hair, a smile tugging at his mouth.

Noticing this, Cosette looked away and at the food she was picking for her box. But when Marius snuck a glance at her, she had another little smile too. She almost wanted to follow up on basically saying that she'd really miss hanging out with him alone with something else, something less vague, something that might actually--finally--lead to something.

Unfortunately, her nerve had left her, and then the moment was over already.

Working on their boxes, they talked some with other volunteers and mostly with each other. Despite their attempts to be quiet, everyone else in overhearing range still heard all the discussions about Combeferre's new glasses, what Bossuet and his parents would get to eat at Red Lobster tonight, and hopes for Courfeyrac and Grantaire to both get over being sick soon.

"Hey, could you guys be quieter?" the college Enjolras clone asked after a while. Embarrassed, they nodded.

And they were quieter, at least up until Marius suggested they race each other over to the bin for completed meal boxes. Cosette knew they probably shouldn't, but when he smiled like that she always had a hard time being a buzzkill.

It wasn't that long of a run, really. Didn't make a big scene or anything, this just wasn't the right time or place. The adults in the room crossed their arms at Marius and Cosette.

"Sorry," they both blurted.

Thankfully (for Valjean's sake), they weren't exactly punished. The same lady from earlier asked them to bring over the extra boxes in her upstairs office, which she had been planning for them to do anyway.

Marius and Cosette still knew it was a good way to get them out of the main room, though, and as they walked upstairs, they found the whole thing pretty funny.

"Did you see Future Enjolras' face?" laughed Cosette, trying to keep her voice down and hoping that noise from this stairwell didn't travel. "I mean, you can really see the resemblance."

"Yeah! I swear I saw actual Enjolras make that same exact face when our math teacher gave us all that extra homework last week."

After a quick laugh, she said, "Okay, let's stop being mean… we have to get all our giggles out now, 'cause if we keep doing stuff like that when we get back down there, someone's probably gonna tell Valjean on us."

"You're right," Marius agreed, tapping his fingers on the railing. "Sorry about the race--I should've known better."

"Eh, responsibility shmersponsibility."

Raising his eyebrows, Marius paused on the final step. "Shmersponsibility? Cosette, that's kinda lame."

He said it like a challenge, so she leaned back against the railing and crossed her arms. "Oh yeah? Well, you know what's not lame? The fact that I can identify a bunch of birds just by looking at them!"

"Okay, ya got me." Smiling, he opened the door to the office, and they both entered.

There were only two boxes of food for each of them, making Marius wonder why nobody had brought all of it down earlier. Cosette felt like home: holding the two huge boxes in front of her was kind of like lugging her drum around in band.

Since he had opened the door for her, she did it for Marius this time. Glancing over the top of his boxes at Cosette, he thought about saying something.

And then, he did.

"Hey, um, do you want to go out with me?"

A grin lit up Cosette's face and made Marius shiver.

She was concentrating hard on not freaking out and not dropping her boxes from shock, so when she said yes, it felt like an hour had passed.

Just like that, something had finally happened. Neither knew quite how to feel, or if they even should be feeling anything drastically different. After all, they were still Cosette and Marius, still really great friends who happened to like each other a lot. Uncertainty mixed with relief mixed with excitement.

As they began walking back downstairs, Cosette popped this confusing bubble of emotions.

"Y'know, for all the times I've thought about that in my head, I never really pictured it happening at church, while we're carrying boxes of, uh, oatmeal mix and juice packs."

They laughed really loudly at this together. Hopefully nobody in the main room would hear them and get annoyed, but honestly, Cosette and Marius didn't care.

He couldn't keep a grin off his face. "Well, at least I didn't ask you out over Neomail!"

And _that_ was so hilarious, they still had leftover giggles by the time they got back to packaging meals.

Meanwhile, as Joly helped his siblings with homework, Bossuet had dinner at Red Lobster with his parents, and Musichetta babysat her neighbor's daughter, the three of them had been texting:

**jolllly**

hey guys, what''s up

**chetta**

nothing much. the girl i'm babysitting asked to watch a barbie movie so at least that's fun

**bossuet**

things are good here. i ate 4 lobster biscuits already lol

**chetta**

are you texting at the table??

**bossuet**

i'm in the bathroom

and before you ask, no toilets have overflowed onto me

**jolllly**

lmao. and those biscuits are 2 die for, honestly

**bossuet**

dude you still use 2 for to? chetta help he's turned into a hipster

**chetta**

what have i told you joly?

i''m the only one allowed to be a hipster, i already have all the flannel!!

**jolllly**

pls stop bullying

jk i don't actually care

**bossuet**

and please don't become a hipster chetta, you're too much of a nerd (i'm joking)

**chetta**

i mean… you're really not wrong

**jolllly**

he's really not

**bossuet**

so joly, what are you teaching your siblings so far?

**jolllly**

well i tried to convince them i knew cpr but they saw right through that

**chetta**

and how would that even be relevant to their homework? lol

**jolllly**

oh... well i did explain punnett squares and long division

**bossuet**

i miss punnett squares

it was a simpler time, truly :(

**chetta**

aww, you sound like an old man, so cute

**bossuet**

chetta have i ever told you you're a lot more sarcastic on the phone than in person??

**chetta**

i'll take that as a compliment

**jolllly**

guys my brother and sister are fighting. i think they want to weaponize the succulents

what do i do

**bossuet**

"weaponize the succulents"????

**jolllly**

shut up you're not helping

**chetta**

joly wait come on, you dealed with eponine and bahorel at the library when they were arguing, you can handle your little siblings

(wait is it dealed or dealt? i never know)

**bossuet**

uh maybe it's dealt?

**jolllly**

okay thanks you're probably right chetta

okay me and my other sister got them to quiet down

**chetta**

coolio

**bossuet**

good job dude

also, how did that presentation go anyways?

**jolllly**

pretty good but we got 5 points taken off

i accidentally wrote the title as "how to kill a mockingbird" on one slide

**bossuet**

oh my gosh joly, that's horrible… and hilarious

**chetta**

like you mixed it up with how to train your dragon? oh wow

**jolllly**

yeah i know but at least eponine and bahorel could bond over laughing at me! lol

**bossuet**

oh crap i think i've been in here like 20 minutes now

my parents are gonna think i did the library thing all over again

**chetta**

aww, you should probably get back

**bossuet**

bye guys! this was fun

**chetta**

bye!!! i kinda gotta go too, the barbie movie's almost done and bethany wants me to show her my newest routine from dance

**jolllly**

bye bossuet! bye chetta!


	5. An Insane Amount of Leaves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! it's been a while since I've updated, and to anyone who has been following along with my little story, I apologize. with homework and other writing and just trying to take time to chill, I have to be honest that updating this story is rarely at the top of my priorities. but I really love this story and am going to try to update more regularly!
> 
> anyway, this chapter is an example of the strange phenomenon in writing where sometimes a chapter just goes in a completely different direction than you ever imagined, in this case somehow becoming all about leaves. hopefully that didnt make it sound too weird. enjoy!!

After her US History class with Grantaire and Enjolras (plus Montparnasse, who she talked to every once in a while now), Eponine went outside instead of through the hallway on her way to Trigonometry. She needed to call her brother and sister, Gavroche and Azelma, about their after-school activities and frustratingly complicated carpools.

Typically Eponine didn't mind the outside part of campus, especially when there were bees and dragonflies around, but the stupid downpour that attacked her kinda ruined the mood.

With her hair soaked--even worse, her _scrunchies_ soaked--and her siblings laughing at her over the phone, Eponine stomped the rest of the way to math. The ground could tell that she really meant it.

Ms. Hutcheson didn't care that she was a few minutes late, and just told her to get into a group with Grantaire and Musichetta. They'd been doing group projects in math for the past couple of weeks, ever since Cosette and Marius told their friends they had started dating. Everyone was super happy for them; that was a pretty crazy day. Musichetta may or may not have actually screamed.

Eponine sat down with her group, and started complaining immediately.

"I mean, the sky's been blue all day!" she said, taking the green sweatshirt Grantaire offered to dry herself off. "What's up with that?"

Musichetta shrugged sympathetically, and at the next table over, Combeferre shared his own story of getting rained on at his brother's last chess tournament.

It lightened the mood, thankfully, getting laughs from his partners, Courfeyrac and Enjolras, and the three at the other table.

Across the room, Jehan and Cosette were chatting about band. More specifically, she critiqued how busy these past few weeks had been, and they rambled on about stuff Montparnasse did recently. Feuilly and Marius, who were in a group with the two of them, shared an amused look.

Bahorel, Bossuet, and Joly made up another group. They were getting on relatively well, since Bahorel, who really liked math he understood and who understood a lot of it, was actually more in the mood to do his work than make jokes.

"Okay, we're going to be making unit circle posters," Ms. Hutcheson reminded everyone (y'know… not just the thirteen main people). "Joly, can you pass out rulers? I have to grab more supplies from my office."

Always happy to have something to do, Joly got started on this right away.

The rulers came in practically every color--as elementary school-y as this was, nobody really minded. Grantaire got a red one, and Enjolras got a green one. This clearly wouldn't work so they switched after a moment.

"Hey, wanna sword fight?" Courfeyrac asked Combeferre, holding up his ruler.

Rolling his eyes but still grinning, Combeferre used his ruler as a sword too. "Duh."

The silly things they liked to do in class often caught on, and so was the case with ruler-sword fighting, since Ms. Hutcheson was in her office. Everyone knew their fun would end right when the teacher came back, but it was one of those situations where that doesn't really matter.

Unable to find an in with Combeferre and Courfeyrac's sword fight, Enjolras sat there and contently played with his ruler, flipping it up and then catching it.

"Guys, calm down, maybe?" Joly asked his classmates. "Well… it's not like rulers have pointy edges anyway."

He looked over to Musichetta, and then Bossuet, sharing a shrug with them both.

This lasted a little longer, with the loudest laughs coming from Cosette and Marius (who were basically poking each other with rulers but found it hilarious anyway), until Ms. Hutcheson came back into the room.

She sighed; this was what she had expected, pretty much.

Enjolras, having just flipped his ruler into the air, jumped a little when the teacher called for everyone to stop. He turned in his seat really quickly…

And then the ruler hit him on the head.

Joly was over before Enjolras even finished saying ow, and everyone else had quieted, including Ms. Hutcheson. Courfeyrac and Combeferre felt especially bad, because it was their whole sword fighting idea that had started this. One table over, Grantaire stared at the ground worriedly.

"Are you okay?" Bahorel called, from the other side of the room. He, along with Bossuet, Jehan, Feuilly, Cosette, Marius, and their other friends, had concerned looks.

"I'm fine," Enjolras said, eyes wide. "It was just a ruler."

Ms. Hutcheson stepped closer and looked at Enjolras' head for a bump. She couldn't see anything because of all his hair, but she said, "Still, you should go to the nurse just in case. Who wants to go with him?"

Immediately, Courfeyrac and Combeferre raised their hands. But Ms. Hutcheson shook her head.

"If I'm not wrong, you two started the whole playing with rulers thing," she said. They unhappily confirmed this. "I get that you were just doing something fun, but now you need to actually do your work."

Now she was looking around, probably about to pick someone randomly. Before he could overthink it too much, Grantaire volunteered to go with Enjolras.

"Alright. Take a hall pass."

He grabbed the hall pass, tucked it into his pocket, and made Musichetta and Eponine promise to not start drawing on the unit circle poster until he got back. Meanwhile, Combeferre and Courfeyrac apologized to Enjolras, who insisted that it wasn't their fault and that he was fine. Still, he couldn't help rubbing the spot on his head that the ruler had hit.

After a while of silent walking, Grantaire said, "So, first I fall off a table, then you let a ruler hit you on the head. I think this is becoming a pattern."

Enjolras laughed, looking around at the empty hallway and all its unused lockers. Everything echoed. "Yeah--and I doubt there's gonna be any gnomes at the nurse's office."

This made Grantaire crack up, and it occurred to Enjolras that this might have been the first time he'd ever made him laugh really hard. Yeah, he would say unintentionally funny things from time to time when they would argue with each other during history class, but not like this. It was nice.

"But anyway, that whole table incident must have been like a curse. I was sore for half a week, and then I had that stupid everlasting cankersore, and then me and Courf both got sick." Grantaire shook his head. "Hopefully I didn't just jinx you, ha ha."

"Right," Enjolras said, clearly not buying that. "I do have some advice for you about that, though. You should, I dunno, try to exit all tables the _normal people way_ from now on."

Grantaire bit down a laugh. "Please shut up."

"Okay, yeah."

They kept making their way to the nurse's office, talking about stuff like Joly's funny but honestly endearing medical obsession (Grantaire was surprised that he hadn't completely taken charge after the ruler hit Enjolras) and the fact that Enjolras had recently applied for a job at the Musain, a tiny local Mexican fast food place not unlike Taco Bell, except for the fact that people were always confused upon their first time entering, having seen its name and assumed rather logically that it was some kind of 19th-century-esque French cafe. Grantaire offered him some waterfall-ed sips out of his bottle of lemonade, which Enjolras gratefully accepted.

Back in class, every group was chugging along, doing their project at whatever pace was best for them. Feuilly slipped fruit snacks out of his pockets and discreetly gave some to Jehan, Cosette, and Marius. The two of them were trying to hold hands and do math at the same time, but it wasn't working because, well, _math._

Always an avid multitasker, Eponine texted Azelma and Gavroche under the table about new carpool problems and kept complaining to Musichetta about the rain she ran into earlier.

She frizzed her hair with Grantaire's sweatshirt. "The thing that really bugs me is, it already stopped. Isn't that stupid?"

"Super stupid." Musichetta wrote down more notes for the unit circle poster and tugged at her blue-green flannel, grateful Eponine hadn't needed it to dry herself off too. Honestly, she wished Eponine would get started on the project already, but the best thing to do in these situations was to let her complain herself out. "So you couldn't get under a tree out there?"

"Well… not really. It was closer to the door than to a tree and then a door." She gestured ruefully to her hair and clothes, which were still damp. "Not close enough, though."

At the next table over, Combeferre and Courfeyrac had been doing their work and chatting about The Office (their favorite show).

Courfeyrac cut into the girls' conversation: "You gotta sue the trees, Eponine. It's their fault."

This made his three friends laugh. "Seriously," Eponine remarked, "all those trees and all those leaves, and they couldn't protect me from the rain at all! What a total scam."

Almost on cue, some wind shook a tall sycamore outside one of Ms. Hutcheson's windows, and a bunch of branches came whirling by, looking very offended. Courfeyrac and Eponine both stuck their tongues out at the window, cracking up laughing.

Meanwhile, Combeferre was deep in thought, as he often was.

"Hey, guys, you ever wonder how many leaves there are in the whole world?" he asked, adjusting his glasses. "Like, I mean, for all the trees on our campus, maybe there's more leaves on them than students that go here. Wouldn't that be cool?"

"That'd be super cool," Musichetta gushed. "There really are a bunch of them on every tree, so I wouldn't be surprised."

Just like the sword-fighting-with-rulers idea had caught on quickly with the whole class, so did this wacky discussion about leaves. The people next to the four of them had overheard and added their ideas, and of course when their friends heard they had to take part. It wasn't like this would result in any rulers to the head, so Ms. Hutcheson pretended to ignore it.

Bossuet wondered if there was any country on Earth where the number of leaves was the same as the number of people. Someone else suggested leaf skyscrapers.

"What's that?" Feuilly asked, sharing a confused look with Jehan.

"If you stacked up all the leaves in the world," the other student explained. That _would_ make a very tall stack.

Still hung up on her rain incident, Eponine brought forth the idea of tree clouds. They'd follow you around and protect you from rain, only occasionally dumping leaves and stuff. Understandably, nobody really knew how to react to this.

"Hmm… what would be more," mused Combeferre, "stars in the Milky Way or leaves on Earth?"

He'd meant this to be just him talking to himself, but everyone else heard anyway. Joly's eyes got wide, and Bahorel and Ms. Hutcheson, who hadn't been that interested in the subject so far, both looked intrigued. Everyone had thoughts on this.

"The Milky Way is super huge and there's a bunch of places without many trees, so it's definitely stars!"

"No, rainforests would totally bridge that gap!"

"Yeah, plus the Milky Way's only one galaxy in the whole entire _Universe_."

With people talking over each other and arguing, the noise was becoming too much. Ms. Hutcheson shushed the loudest ones and asked for someone to look it up.

"So much for only working on math," Courfeyrac whispered to Combeferre, with a grin.

Combeferre grinned too. He loved when other people actually thought his random ideas were interesting, and of course when they could all have some fun in class.

By this time, Cosette had looked up how many leaves there were on Earth. "According to Google, it's more than 120… um, is quadrillion the one after trillion?"

A few people confirmed that it was. "Okay, yeah, it's like 120 quadrillion leaves," she said, shocked. That was just an _insane_ amount of leaves. Like, take a number that you can't even imagine, and this is a number that that one could never begin to imagine. "Does anyone have how many stars?"

"It's only 250 billion," Jehan answered. Then they laughed. "Did I just say _only_ 250 billion?"

Everybody had to laugh at the absurdity of this. Bahorel made a joke about how "only 250 billion" was classic rich person logic, and then the next topic of discussion was how expensive it would be to stay in a leaf skyscraper hotel, if they could somehow exist. Also, given what they'd learned just now about all the world's leaves, would a leaf skyscraper hotel be tall enough to exit the atmosphere?

As if this were a legitimate question, they all mulled it over. Sadly, Combeferre gave the verdict that it was probably impossible to know.

Enjolras's head was checked out by the school nurse, and it was thankfully fine. Needing to explain the embarrassing circumstances of flipping a ruler into the air and having it accidentally fall onto his head was the worst part of it, actually.

On the way back from the nurse's office, he and Grantaire took the scenic route through the outside courtyard, not talking much but enjoying the breeze and the quiet. They fared much better than Eponine had: still no rain, just lots of pleasant wind. Decent mid September weather, in fact. Since it would be fall later this month, there was already a sizable pile of dead leaves forming in between the courtyard's trees.

Trying to think of something to say, Grantaire spotted this particular pile of leaves. He nudged Enjolras. "Hey, I dare you to go jump in that leaf pile!"

"What?" laughed Enjolras, pulling his hair back to keep the wind from making it flap all over the place. "Don't be silly."

Grantaire gave him a look. "I'm not being silly. Come on, I'll do it too." He rubbed his arms, wishing he'd gotten his sweatshirt back from Eponine before leaving. Maybe the leaf pile would warm him up a little.

It was Enjolras' competitive side that won him over, and the fact that he hadn't jumped into leaves in a very long time. Besides, as far as the two of them knew, math class was still uneventful and way more boring than this.

"Okay, here goes." Getting a running start, Enjolras catapulted into the leaf pile. And it was awesome!

Sinking in the leaves, a bunch of laughs bubbled up from him. Grantaire grinned.

After a while of rolling around in the leaves, he moved over so Grantaire could jump in. Once he had, they had a leaf-snowball fight that basically just devolved into looking up at the trees and talking about random stuff. This was nice, but eventually even Grantaire had to admit that they needed to get back to class.

Enjolras stood up, picking leaves from his clothes and his hair. "Did I get everything?"

"Nah, there's one up here." As he said this, Grantaire reached one arm out to pluck the leaf from Enjolras' curls. This action, and the fact that he might have let his hand hover for a little longer than necessary, made Enjolras blink a few times.

And as quick as the moment had happened, Grantaire looked away, letting the leaf fall down and trying not to seem too embarrassed.

The two of them started walking through the rest of the courtyard, thinking.

Not sure what to make of what had just happened or of the little blush he felt himself get, Enjolras instead wondered how far Combeferre and Courfeyrac were on the project. He almost asked for another sip of lemonade, but Grantaire had drunk all of it already.

Soon they were back at class, each happy that this unfamiliar awkwardness would be over. Enjolras knocked on the door, and as someone opened it, they heard something that sounded quite strange out of context.

"What if all of the leaves could _cover the entire planet?_ Or even more planets than just ours!" Marius was saying, excitedly, while Cosette watched him with a fond little smile.

Then everyone noticed Enjolras and Grantaire, who were both equally confused.

"What does that have to do with the unit circle?" asked Grantaire.

Musichetta explained, and Joly asked how the nurse's office visit had gone. He was quite pleased with the answer.

"Another medical victory," he bragged to Bossuet.

"I hate to break it to you, buddy, but you didn't really do much."

Class carried on, consisting of more actual work and a few more mini leaf discussions. At one point, Grantaire glanced over at Enjolras. He had just turned away when Enjolras glanced over at him, with a tiny nervous smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you're wondering why i made the musain a mexican fast food place, i originally had it actually be taco bell in the story and then decided to change it, but didn't want to change too much about what i had already written further in the story. lol!


	6. Blueberry Bushes and Spanish Moss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy new year! I hope you're all doing well. I know I said that I would start updating more often, and then that just didn't happen lol, but maybe after this is when I'll start being better with that.
> 
> Anyway, I hope everyone has a good new year's eve, and that you start the new year off well! It's been a crazy year for loads of reasons, but at least it wasn't all bad. For example, I started this fic this year, and I've loved writing it.
> 
> Also, I need to say that you should never practice CPR on someone who doesn't need it!! This will make sense when you read the chapter lol. I put it in before learning that it's a big no-no, and I was too lazy to come up with something to replace that with, so yeah.
> 
> Enjoy! Happy new year!!

It had been nearly three weeks since Cosette and Marius started dating, and they hadn't had a real first date yet. (The rest of volunteering didn't count, especially since Future Enjolras split the two of them up for being so loud.) Why?

Because things were simply too busy. Band was wearing Cosette, Jehan, and Combeferre out, with Homecoming in nearly a month and a lot more preparation needing to be done in that time. And in a stupid series of bad luck, Marius always happened to have too much homework on the days she was free, or the weather was totally wack.

Another issue was Valjean, Cosette's dad.

He could be overprotective, and for some weird reason he wouldn't let Cosette and Marius go on a date to a restaurant without him there to chaperone. That would be super awkward. So, on the first non-rainy, hardly-any-responsibilities Saturday of seemingly the whole entire month of September, they were finally having a date. In Cosette's yard.

Though it was certainly unusual, Marius couldn't be mad at Valjean for the weird date restrictions. The guy was just too nice to hold a grudge against--he even made a special lunch for him. Scrambled eggs with _extra hot sauce!_ His favorite!

And on Cosette's side, well, she did really love her yard, all full of trees and flowers and whatnot. She was just happy to finally spend some more alone time with her boyfriend.

"Thanks for lunch, Dad," she said, taking her plate of eggs covered in pesto and glancing down at her phone, which had just dinged. It was Grantaire on the group chat, with a few pictures of some abstract watercolor art he'd done.

She looked at Marius, who was eyeing his eggs hungrily. "Do you want to eat in here, or outside?"

"Um, outside." He turned to Valjean. "Can we?"

Standing over the sink, Valjean let out a hearty laugh. "Yes, Marius, you guys can eat outside," he confirmed. "I'm not _that_ protective."

They all laughed at this, even Marius, who shoved his embarrassment to the side for the moment.

"Alright, let's go." Cosette elbowed him, tucked her phone inside her pocket, and waved bye to her dad. Obediently, Marius followed her out the door.

Spanish moss dripped from the oak trees outside, always ready for Cosette to reach a hand up and dangle it through. In her yard and beyond, birds chirped and insects buzzed. There was even a wonderful jasmine smell in the air, because the jasmine flowers hadn't wilted yet. Basically, Cosette's favorite place in the world was living up to its title.

"I'm glad you were okay with this," she told Marius. "Since, y'know, it's a pretty weird kind of date."

As they turned the corner around her house, headed towards the picnic table, Marius smiled and shrugged. "It's not that weird, actually." He walked around in a circle, gesturing to everything around them. "Yummy food, awesome scenery… and, well, we get to hang out. Just us. This is really nice."

That made Cosette break out into a grin. Before she could say something equally sweet back, she got distracted by her phone. Apparently, their other friends had seen Grantaire's pictures on the group chat and were responding now.

She and Marius set their plates onto the picnic table and sat down, each pulling out their phones. "Ooh, this is nice," he said. "He's definitely getting better at painting."

"Yeah, he is." Cosette scanned everyone else's texts.

**enj**

Good job!!

**combeferre**

yeah, that's really cool

**ponine**

very drippy. I approve..

**jehan**

whoa that's awesme, can i use that as like a profile pic for my gravity falls fanfic???

**bossuet**

jehan do u even know how to do that? also it looks super nice, r

**jehan**

yes obviously... okay no i don't

**feuilly**

awesome art! and jehan maybe there's a wikihow about it?

**courf**

Bro, wikihow is wack. they have this one article about different ways to pick your nose!

also the watercolor is super nice :D

**combeferre**

and why were you looking for an article about picking your nose?

**jehan**

ok i'll try that feuilly, thx

**courf**

i was simply living my life, ferre. i will not accept criticism for using the internet for it's intended purpose: super weird and random shit

**enj**

lmao

**grantairrrrre**

hey everybody, thanks!! gosh you guys like to digress

oh and jehan, if you're somehow able to do that, you can totally use my art for your fic

**jehan**

thx!!!!!!!!

Laughing as they read the conversation, Cosette and Marius added their compliments of Grantaire's art and set their phones aside. Joly, Musichetta, and Bahorel soon added some comments, but the two of them ignored it.

Hopefully the group chat would quiet down after this, so they could instead focus on their date.

"Seriously, you guys have such a nice yard," Marius said, after eating some eggs. He pointed to the gingko and the poplar, the blueberry bushes lining a pond and the roses lining the house. "Valjean should be a professional gardener."

"He probably could be," she agreed. "Well… gardening and fixing up the yard was a big part of how we bonded, after he adopted me."

Marius nodded, knowing that talk of her adoption was kinda serious. After her mom died, Cosette had actually been the foster child of the Thenardiers, Eponine's family. It hadn't lasted long, thankfully for Cosette, but it wasn't a pleasant time in her life. That's why she and Valjean avoided the Thenardier parents at all costs, but had obviously kept in touch with Eponine and her siblings. In fact, the entire huge friend group had sort of sprang up around their secret friendship.

Some heaviness left Cosette's face when a cute bird landed a few feet away from them, chirping and nibbling at the grass. They shared an excited look.

"Don't scare it," she whispered, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"I won't. I know this is your area of expertise." Marius squinted at the bird, which had a black and white head, a gray body, and a bunch of fluffy feathers. "Do you know what species it is?"

Cosette shrugged, watching it hop from bush to bush. "Might be a Carolina chickadee, or a warbler I forgot the name of. Probably a chickadee."

Though he thought that "chickadee" was a hilarious bird name, Marius kept his laughs quiet. Finishing up their lunches, he and Cosette watched the adorable bird prance around the yard. Being this close to it was something special.

But then, both of their phones dinged. It was Joly, with a video one of his moms had shot of him practicing CPR (very very carefully, of course!) on his younger brother. And the bird flew away.

"Darn it," Cosette muttered. "Come back! We're sorry!"

"Hey, it's okay." With a little smile, Marius bumped her with his shoulder. "Let's watch Joly's video, it looks funny."

They did, and they saw how impressed Joly was with his newfound medical knowledge. Also how much he and his siblings laughed when their other mom walked in on this, freaked out, and accidentally knocked a few succulents over.

Laughing, Marius replied that he hoped their plants would be okay. Cosette only giggled a little, still staring out into the woods and wishing the chickadee would come back.

Noticing this, he had a worried frown. But Cosette was reading everyone else's texts, and he didn't want to interrupt.

**chetta**

that's a big oof buddy

**jolllly**

yeah i know, but it's really funny right?

**enj**

Definitely funny! so you actually kinda learned cpr? cus that's super cool

**jolllly**

yep! I am totally awesome

**combeferre**

So did you take anatomy this year for science, since you wanna be a doctor?

**grantairrrrre**

And have you been watching extra medical dramas? lol

**jehan**

if u ever want to practice surgery, my sister has a broken cabbage patch doll!!

**jolllly**

jehan... what XD

i've been watching plenty of grey's anatomy and house, and no i'm unfortunately taking chemistry cus last year i still wanted to be a chemist

**courf**

you can be the world's first doctor chemist! a doctist??

**bossuet**

he's also surprisingly good at organizing and interior design stuff… a doctist designer? a desidoctist?!?

**ponine**

yep it's official joly's gonna be a desidoctist!!

**jolllly**

:D

**bahorel**

Wait guys i have a joke

okay how many careers is joly gonna have?

**jehan**

uh… three

**bahorel**

no

**feuilly**

Dude what is it then

**bahorel**

only 250 billion!

After that, the group chat erupted with ten different lmao's or XD's or things like that. Cosette and Marius thought it was a funny joke, referencing the whole discussion about leaves from last week, but they were becoming somewhat annoyed. Why did everyone have to be on their phones having hilarious conversations _right now_? Why not yesterday or this morning, when nothing important was going on?

"It's not their fault," Cosette said, "but still. We're on a date! It was supposed to be just us."

"Yeah, I know."

She looked through the trees another time. "Should we go leave our phones back inside?"

Marius said he felt too lazy, making her giggle. They chatted about their friends for a little while longer, and he noticed that Cosette kept watching for her bird. "Hey, do you need a distraction from the bird being gone? I can juggle berries. Or I can swing around on your guys' tire swing until I fall off."

"No, I'm good." Smiling softly, Cosette leaned her head on Marius' shoulder. "I mean, you can juggle whenever you want--I love that. But it was just a bird, and I'm okay."

"Awesome." He looked down at Cosette, her hair tousled and catching the light in the cutest way. His heart did a little flippity flop. "You're the best, you know that? You're so cool. You know so much about birds, and about Disney movies, and you're so good with that drum in band."

"Aww, thanks," she said. "You're so cool, too! You juggle, sometimes you climb trees--and I don't know anyone else who can tolerate as much hot sauce as you do."

This was becoming awfully sappy, but Cosette and Marius didn't really care. They laced their fingers together.

For the rest of the date, they did silly things like jumping over and into puddles, trying to catch berries in their mouths, and swinging around in the tire swing until they were dizzy. Plus, they talked a lot.

The group chat was still going strong: Combeferre told everyone the awesome news that he'd gotten the second place prize for that scholarship he was writing the essay for that one time at the library, and Enjolras had the awesome news that he'd gotten a job at the Musain. Everybody congratulated the two of them, including Cosette and Marius, but eventually they did just go back inside to drop their phones and plates off.

"Having fun?" asked Valjean, done with his dishes and now reading a book.

"A bunch of fun, Mr. Fauchelevent," Marius answered, smiling as widely as Cosette was. Valjean said he was happy to hear it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just in case you didnt see the end note from the last chapter: originally the place enjolras gets a job at was just taco bell, but then i decided to change it to the musain. however, i kept it as a mexican fast food place cus i didnt want to change too much about what i had already written further in the story. lol! 
> 
> and if you read chapter 5 before it was updated, here is the description i added in of it (to clear up any confusion, also i just like how it sounds lol): a tiny local Mexican fast food place not unlike Taco Bell, except for the fact that people were always confused upon their first time entering, having seen its name and assumed rather logically that it was some kind of 19th-century-esque French cafe


	7. Cafeteria Games

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey, I'm back! I really should stop saying I'm going to get better with uploading regularly, cus it keeps not happening, but I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually lol.

"This is an intervention." Defiantly, Courfeyrac stuck his spork upright into his mashed potatoes. "We haven't all hung out in, like, three weeks! That needs to change."

Joly pointed out, "We're all hanging out right now."

"No, the cafeteria doesn't count." Seeing Marius about to say something, he added, "And neither does math class."

The rest of his friends looked at their lunches, either from the cafeteria or brought from home, and considered their dilemma. Homecoming was in two weeks, which did seem like a long wait until the thirteen of them could actually hang out someplace fun. But with band growing more and more demanding for Cosette, Combeferre, and Jehan, the swim season still in full swing for Feuilly, lots of babysitting gigs for Eponine and Musichetta, and a new job for Enjolras, options were tight.

Always a realist, Musichetta told Courfeyrac that maybe they would just have to accept the fact that not much would work leading up to Homecoming. Hanging out outside of school in smaller groups, as well as having lunch and math class, plus the bleachers every once in a while, was way better than nothing.

"I know that, Chetta," he sighed, "but it's frustrating. I mean, there's no harm in _trying_ to figure something out, right?"

She shook her head, and Bossuet said, "Of course not, dude."

"And there's gonna be no problems with Homecoming, we have everything planned. It's gonna be great," added Bahorel. He was right: Homecoming, the past two years of high school, had always been super fun for the thirteen friends. There was just something about Sweet Caroline, Take On Me, and the Cha-Cha Shuffle that would put anyone in a good mood. "Hey, maybe they'll finally play some Hamilton this year!"

"Is that really school dance music, though?" Feuilly wondered. "Like, yeah, I know it's really good, but I can't picture anyone doing a conga line to King George III."

Before Bahorel could argue with that, Enjolras nudged Combeferre and Feuilly on the arm. "That reminds me! We gotta play Paper Football Trivia, there's that history test on Friday."

Paper Football Trivia, invented by the three of them back in middle school, was their patented way to study for tests. It went like this: someone would be the goalie and make the football goal with their hands, and ask the other two a trivia question related to the class. Whoever answered right first could try to flick the paper football into the hand goal, and if they scored they got two points. Then they were the goalie, and so on.

Enjolras wasn't in the same history class as Combeferre and Feuilly, but they happened to have their next test on the same day, so it all worked out.

While they tried to remember who had kept the paper football from last time, Grantaire pulled out his sketchbook over on the other side of the table. He flipped past awkward but improving sketches of cartoon characters, Marius' stuffed animals, and Bossuet as different dinosaurs to a blank page.

"Okay, I'm gonna try thinking of different places for us to go," Courfeyrac said, stirring around his mashed potatoes and staring at them like they'd give him some answers. "Well… there's always the library, there might be a few restaurants we can all afford that also have large enough tables--also, hanging out at the Musain during Enjolras' shifts, that's an idea--and we could try the park. Haven't been there in a while."

Cosette and Marius, each with PB&J sandwiches, nodded. "Yeah, the park's really nice this time of year," she said.

"And there's enough of us who drive now so that we don't need any parents to bring us," Marius brought up. "I guess that applies to anywhere we go, not just the park, though."

Bossuet was about to say that at least October weather had been nicer so far than September's rainy weather, when he bumped into his water bottle just the _tiniest_ amount. And of course, it spilled and ruined his little plastic baggie of cookies.

Those were his last snack, and he was still kinda hungry, so he looked over to Joly's and Musichetta's lunches, in hopes that they had something extra. But Musichetta was wolfing down all of her macaroni, green beans, and cornbread, and Joly's home lunch looked pretty small.

"Hey, Feuilly…" Bossuet called, feeling somewhat guilty because this happened a lot. He had bad luck with snacks. Half the time, practically, they ended up lost, spilled on, or accidentally fallen on the floor.

Feuilly already knew the drill, and he didn't mind tossing Bossuet a pack of fruit snacks at all. Bossuet gave him an appreciative thumbs up.

Once Combeferre found the paper football buried in his backpack, he set it in the middle of the table and made the goal with his hands. "Alright, guys, what were some of the reasons the US won the Revolutionary War?"

Each thinking hard, Enjolras and Feuilly ate some lunch.

"Home territory, they had more to lose, and all the guerilla warfare," answered Feuilly. "There could be more, I dunno."

"Those are the main ones, so I think it counts," Enjolras said. Combeferre agreed, and so Feuilly sized up the paper football, flicking it with a lot of power. The thing hit Combeferre in the face, but that still makes a goal. (And at least paper can't break glasses!)

He said sorry to Combeferre, and then broke out in a grin, high-fiving Enjolras. "Boom! First two points of the game."

As they carried on, Grantaire struggled to find something to draw. Jehan and Eponine had an idea after he asked them for advice.

"Okay, one of us comes up with a category of stuff for you to draw," Eponine said.

Fiddling with their bright and wacky jacket, Jehan went on. "And then you draw as much of it as you can in however much time we give you! Sound fun?"

"Sure, I'm up for speed sketching."

Bahorel, who sat by the three of them, asked to play the game too. He, Eponine, and Jehan would take turns suggesting the category, and would all judge Grantaire's final work.

The first round was various animals in hats, as proposed by Jehan. "Alright, that's pretty cool," Grantaire told them. And with that, Eponine set a timer on her phone, and he started drawing.

Other students bustled around the table, feet shuffling and plastic trays falling into the trash. Harsh lights shone overhead.

Because his three judges were doing nothing except having some food and watching, the minute and a half felt excruciatingly long to them and like barely any time to Grantaire. On his sketchbook page was a scribbly manatee in a baseball cap, a hardly symmetrical butterfly in a beret, and an unfinished gator in a top hat. Overall, pretty darn good.

"Very creative," said Bahorel. "I think we need to pass it around the table, don't you guys?"

To Grantaire's embarrassment, Eponine and Jehan immediately agreed. He tried to shoot this down, but he couldn't come up with a decent enough reason.

Honestly, it was different showing his art to everyone in person than it had been on the group chat. Additionally, the perfectionist in him (which didn't come out much) didn't quite love these sketches as much as the little watercolor pieces he'd been doing.

But the sketchbook was passed around, and everyone did pretty much love it. At a concerned look from Musichetta and Bossuet, Grantaire let his shoulders untense and instead grinned at his friends' compliments.

When it reached the opposite end of the table, Enjolras took his hands out of the goal formation and really looked at it.

"Awesome!" he called back to Grantaire, handing it over to Feuilly and Combeferre with a smile. Pathetically, that was enough to make Grantaire feel all warm and fuzzy for the rest of lunch. He ignored this and focused on Eponine's choice for next round.

"Okay… really bad Halloween costumes!"

This made Courfeyrac pipe up. "Hey, that reminds me," he said, "what are we doing for Halloween? We can totally do something then."

"What about a party?" Wiping her mouth on her flannel sleeve, Musichetta turned to Cosette. "Didn't you and Valjean always want to host one of those?"

Those at the table who were paying attention to this discussion murmured amongst themselves; Enjolras, Feuilly, and Combeferre kept playing Paper Football Trivia and woo-hooing when one of them made a goal.

Cosette loved the idea. "That would be perfect! I know Dad's been looking for an excuse to Halloween-ify the yard."

"So is everybody gonna be free on Halloween, as far as you guys know?" Marius wondered, trying to get his question to reach all twelve of his friends. The Paper Football Trivia bunch were still in their own world, so Joly gave Feuilly a nudge and repeated the question.

Everyone would be free, thankfully. Cosette leaned to look over Musichetta and Bossuet's shoulders, and asked Eponine, "Do you think your siblings would be able to come, too? I know you'd all have to lie about where you're going… it's just been a while since I've seen them…"

Eponine's eyes widened a little. "I think they would, if they feel like it's better than trick-or-treating," she said. "And don't worry about us, we lie to our parents for fun sometimes."

This may have been somewhat bigger of a deal than she made it seem, if her awkward laugh was anything to go by. But the look she sent Grantaire, whose expression was worried, meant that whatever it was, it didn't matter too much. At least not right now.

After some silence, Courfeyrac clapped his hands and grinned. "Okay, so that's a plan! Thanks, Snow White."

"Yeah, you're welcome, Snow White," Cosette teased. This was an inside joke; Courfeyrac had a tendency to give people nicknames that got thrown back at him.

For example, Cosette was Snow White because she loved animals (specifically birds) and Disney movies, but then, as she had pointed out, so did he. Another instance was when Jehan shared their Gravity Falls poetry fanfiction Google Doc with everyone. Courfeyrac had commented "nice work Captain Poetry", and Jehan had written "nice work Captain Nicknames!" back. One day, after they binged a few episodes of The Office, Courfeyrac called Combeferre Dwight just to get on his nerves, so he got his revenge by saying Courf was Kelly.

This one hadn't gotten thrown back at Courfeyrac, but it was one of everybody's favorite nicknames: Enjolras, after giving one of his classic "you can do it, but either way, once it's done it's done, and you won't have to worry about it" pre-test motivational speeches, was now Our Fearless Leader. Enjolras pretended to find this obnoxious, but in reality he liked it.

As lunch carried on, every mini group at the table did their own thing.

Grantaire drew horrible Halloween costumes while Jehan, Bahorel, and Eponine watched; Combeferre accidentally said that _Michael_ Jackson was the 7th president of the US instead of Andrew Jackson, and face-palmed while Enjolras and Feuilly cracked up laughing and comforted him; Marius ate his sandwich, watching Cosette and Courfeyrac talk up a storm about the Halloween party; Musichetta caught the fruit snacks Bossuet dropped while trying to throw them into his mouth, and offered a few of them to Joly, who didn't have any snacks left because this morning he'd forgotten to pack as many as he usually did.

"Do you think you should buy something extra?" she asked him. "That lunch looked pretty small."

Joly shrugged. "Maybe I should, I dunno."

Finishing the last of his fruit snacks, Bossuet suggested the double chocolate chip cookie, which was super yummy and just 50 cents.

"That does sound good," Joly said, "but I'm always kinda scared that cafeteria food is gonna be secretly gross."

A few people pointed out that, yes, plenty of cafeteria food wasn't the best, but the last thing that would _ever_ be gross was a double chocolate chip cookie.

"Okay… well maybe I just don't like going up to order things by myself!"

Everyone softened a little, now understanding. Enjolras, Musichetta, and Bossuet all offered to go with him to act as a confidence booster. Then Courfeyrac had an idea.

"We're all going!" he declared.

Understandably, everybody was confused.

Having none of this, Courfeyrac stood up and made motions for his friends to do the same. "Come on, it's two weeks to Homecoming and Halloween's another week after that. This is an excursion--sort of--so let me have this."

It was certainly strange for thirteen people to go all the way across the cafeteria just for one of them to buy a cookie, but he did have a point.

Kind of.

Sometimes silliness was a good enough reason to do things. And so, each of them got up and walked over to the cookie stand.

"Do we have to all be in line with him, too?" Combeferre asked, with a little smirk, when they reached the place.

Courfeyrac was somewhere in between glaring and laughing. "No, we don't. Please, and I cannot stress this enough, shut up."

While Joly got in line with Musichetta and Bossuet, Grantaire wandered over by the trash can, right near a large window. He tucked his hands in the pockets of his sweatshirt while looking out at the outside courtyard, and jumped a little when Enjolras appeared next to him.

The rest of them--Cosette, Marius, Bahorel, Eponine, Jehan, and Feuilly--were reading through all of the snack options listed on the cookie stand's board, debating what their favorites were.

Suddenly, there was a yelp from near the trash can.

Somebody's rolled up tinfoil ball of lunch garbage had hit Enjolras in the head. Everyone rushed over to see what had happened, except Joly, Bossuet, and Musichetta, who stayed in line. Then they heard someone coming and apologizing.

"Shit, sorry about that!" said Montparnasse, with Marie trailing behind. His eyes widened when he looked around Enjolras to see his friends from band and his friends from the whole spying-on-mean-people-at-the-swim-meet incident, plus the people in their group that he knew of but didn't quite know.

This was awkward. "Well… I guess now you know why I'm in band and not, like, basketball."

He and Marie stood to the side while everyone checked on Enjolras, who picked up Montparnasse's garbage ball and threw it into the trash. "Guys, I'm completely fine," he insisted, turning to Grantaire and shaking his head.

"Gosh. _One_ ruler falls on my head, and now I'm like a fragile little baby." They shared a laugh.

Grantaire suggested they start calling him Our Fearless Baby, and this made both of them crack up, until they realized all their friends were sort of staring.

Glancing at Marie and Jehan, Montparnasse said, "Again, really sorry. I was aiming for the trash."

"Well, yeah, I hoped so," Enjolras joked awkwardly. "Um, it's okay, dude."

With this now over, Jehan introduced Montparnasse and Marie to everyone they didn't already know. From near the front of the cookie line, Joly, Bossuet, and Musichetta waved hello. Only Courfeyrac and Marius seemed a little apprehensive, at least of Montparnasse, given that he'd just hit their friend in the head.

"Anyway," said Jehan, "what did I tell you about throwing things, Monty?"

"That real life isn't always a game of catch--wait, are you talking about the water bottle incident?" he asked, crossing his arms. "It was just _one time_. Stop bringing it up. I've suffered enough."

Cosette and Combeferre giggled a little bit. The others, including Marie, were getting curious.

Ignoring Montparnasse's groans, Jehan recounted the incident, which had taken place during band last August. "It was a dark and stormy night… and I was passing out the water bottles after practice. This was a normal thing, but Monty was caught by surprise for some reason. I tossed the water bottle to him, and in the worst game of Hot Potato ever, he threw it over to the bleachers… and it burst open and splattered everywhere!"

This made everyone laugh. Even Montparnasse had to admit that it had been hilarious.

"Did that really happen?" Bahorel asked, amazed.

"Well, it was actually the middle of the afternoon and there was no rain at all, but yeah." Montparnasse gave Jehan a brief sideways look. "Pretty ridiculous, I know. I got… possessed by stupidity. Is that a thing?"

Jehan defended their weather lie, claiming artistic license. Combeferre gave Montparnasse a sympathetic shrug, saying, "A few minutes ago I said Michael Jackson was the 7th president, so I get what you mean."

Marie and her brother laughed at this, although they were quite confused at why he would be talking about presidents in the first place. Soon, Joly had successfully ordered his cookie, and the three of them were back.

"Hey, lunch is almost over," Enjolras pointed out, looking at his watch. "Should we get back to our table?"

The group wasn't sure. As Eponine and Feuilly glanced over at Marie and Montparnasse, they saw some disappointment. The two of them exchanged a look.

"Let's stay a little longer," she said. "Screw getting to class on time, right?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just in case you didnt see the end note from the last two chapters: originally the place enjolras gets a job at was just taco bell, but then i decided to change it to the musain. however, i kept it as a mexican fast food place cus i didnt want to change too much about what i had already written further in the story. lol! 
> 
> and if you read chapter 5 before it was updated, here is the description i added in of it (to clear up any confusion, also i just like how it sounds lol): a tiny local Mexican fast food place not unlike Taco Bell, except for the fact that people were always confused upon their first time entering, having seen its name and assumed rather logically that it was some kind of 19th-century-esque French cafe


	8. Homecoming!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> love this chapter! homecoming was always super fun for me, so writing this chapter was really fun :)
> 
> also, in the previous few chapters we mention that enjolras got a job, originally this was at taco bell but i decided to change it to the musain (since the musain is actually from the book). i went back in and changed those brief mentions in the previous chapters, and from now on when his job is mentioned, it's at the musain
> 
> because i didn't want to change too much of what i've already written further in the story, i kept the musain as a mexican fast food place. lol!
> 
> if you didn't see my notes from the previous chapters, i'll include the description of my version of the musain that i added to chapter 5 (to get rid of any confusion, also i just like what i wrote lol): a tiny local Mexican fast food place not unlike Taco Bell, except for the fact that people were always confused upon their first time entering, having seen its name and assumed rather logically that it was some kind of 19th-century-esque French cafe
> 
> hope you like the chapter!

Two weeks passed, not too eventfully but still pleasantly. There weren't too many chances for the gang to hang out outside of school, besides small groups visiting Enjolras at work or having mini study sessions at the library.

Montparnasse and Marie began showing up at their lunch table to chat most days, usually for no longer than ten minutes (which was when his social battery ran out). Even though Montparnasse wasn't the easiest person to warm up to, they all mostly did after a while.

Everyone loved Marie, of course. She was interested in pretty much everything, which was great in this group of friends who all had different interests.

Sometimes she talked to Joly about anatomy facts he'd Googled, sometimes to Grantaire about art, sometimes to Cosette about Disney movies, sometimes to Bahorel and Courfeyrac about her culinary class, and on and on and on.

Classes came and went, with everyone antsy for Homecoming weekend to arrive. People wore face paint and school spirit shirts, posters decorated empty lockers, the band practiced more and more.

Finally, it was Saturday evening.

Laughing and chatting, the thirteen of them made their way to the long line of students waiting to get in the building.

Shadowy trees and blurred street lights overhead, along with just a hint of a chill in the air, made for the perfect kind of Homecoming atmosphere.

Enjolras smoothed his sleeves and turned to Musichetta. "Chetta, I can't believe you're wearing flannel to Homecoming and you're still the best-dressed person here."

Her dappled gray flannel, worn almost as a cardigan with a kaleidoscopic and colorful dress, did look super nice. Certainly better than whatever Jehan was wearing (as far as everyone else could tell, they had somehow mishmashed several completely unrelated outfits into one confusing outfit), and definitely better than Bossuet's crocs (which were actually Joly's, hastily borrowed because of a freak shoe-loss accident).

Grinning, she did a little curtsey. "Do you mean best out of the thirteen of us, or every single student here?" she joked.

They all laughed. Jehan pretended to be incredibly offended that they weren't considered best-dressed, prompting even more giggles.

Feuilly, walking at the front of the group, turned around and took several packs of fruit snacks from his pockets. "Okay, I don't know if it's really not allowed to bring food from home," he said, "but just in case it is, I should give these out now. My pockets look kind of stuffed and it'll be easier if everyone gets their own out here."

Everybody appreciated his smart thinking, and the fact that he brought his friends some food literally everywhere. He tossed the packs out.

"Hey, Combeferre," Feuilly called. "Want a fruit snack?"

Combeferre turned around. "Oh, yeah. I was just looking at these moths down on the sidewalk."

Like birds were to Cosette, moths were to Combeferre. Not all of his friends liked them as much as he did, but they did enjoy seeing the cool things he always noticed. Trying to not startle the moths too much, the thirteen friends watched them for a minute or two. When more people came up behind them on the sidewalk, they started going again.

Walking shoulder to shoulder, Marius and Cosette held hands. Even though they were going to hang out with everyone else most of the time, it was still their first Homecoming together as girlfriend and boyfriend--they were excited.

Grantaire looked over at them and asked, "So are you two gonna be one of those mushy couples who spend the whole night dancing and staring into each other's eyes?"

"Oh, shut up," Cosette laughed, shoving him.

"Yeah, we don't even do anything like that," Marius said. "We don't, right?"

His friends all mumbled something or turned away, leaving Marius to pout at Cosette. She shrugged, and he let it go.

By now they were coming up to the front entrance to school, joining the rest of the crowd. When they got inside, it was time to start having some fun!

All dark and purple, with music bouncing off the walls and thumping through the crowd, the cafeteria looked completely different now than it normally did. Courfeyrac and Bahorel led them all into the fray--only Joly, who wasn't crazy about crowds, seemed reluctant--as Party In The USA died down and was replaced with Dynamite.

For a while, they danced at various degrees of confidence or awkwardness. There were older songs and newer songs, but everything was pretty much a bop.

When Bossuet tripped into a dance move and hurt his ankle a little, the gang decided to take a break and go sit down at a table. After they set their things down and tried to have a conversation over the music, Montparnasse and Marie spotted them.

"Hey, guys!" she called, waving.

"Hey!" Feuilly called back. "You guys can bring a couple of chairs over here if you want!"

The others said hi to the two of them, while they dragged two more chairs over to what was already the biggest table in this part of the cafeteria.

Take On Me thumped in the background. A jumbled mishmash of conversations flitted across the table, including but not limited to: the pros and cons of doing the macarena to Hamilton songs (Feuilly and Bahorel); which nursery rhymes to jokingly ask the DJ to play (Eponine, Joly, and Marie); the best of the streamers and balloons in this particular part of the cafeteria (Cosette and Musichetta); funniest recent moments of playing Neopets (Courfeyrac, Bossuet, and Jehan).

Montparnasse listened to the latter conversation--full of words like Yurble and Puppyblew and Maraqua that sounded like total nonsense to him--for a few minutes before asking what the heck they were saying.

"Oh, it's Neopets," Jehan helpfully provided, while also not-so-helpfully giving no further description of what Neopets was.

Legs crossed and sleeves uneven, Combeferre took his glasses off and tried to clean them on his shirt.

"I wish I still had my old ones," he complained. "They went a lot better with what I'm wearing, these are completely the wrong color--and they're even blurrier now that I tried to clean them, so that's great."

Next to him, Courfeyrac raised his eyebrows. "What are you talking about? They look great, you look fine."

Combeferre took a second to put his blurry glasses back on, with a tiny surprised smile. Then he joked, "Oh wow, guys, it finally happened--he's hitting on me."

Everybody laughed, and then the group discussion turned to plans for Halloween, like whose younger siblings would be coming and all that. Excitedly, Cosette asked Montparnasse and Marie if they would like to attend the party.

He looked to his sister. "If you wanna go, I'm cool with it."

"Yay, we're going to a Halloween party!" Marie exclaimed, getting cheers from everyone.

In the middle of Enjolras and Eponine's Bohemian Rhapsody sing-off, something happened that began a little rift in this group of friends. Most of the people from the swim team came by, to say hi to Feuilly and Marie.

It was an instant mood-killer. Eponine, Bahorel, and Montparnasse had still been hung up on the people who were gossiping meanly at the swim meet all this time, even though nothing had come of it. Jehan was somewhat more willing to let it go, but they still turned away and crossed their arms when the swim team members said hi.

Annoyed, Feuilly and Marie ignored the hostility from the four of them, and Enjolras carried on singing even though Eponine had stopped. Concerned looks passed between everyone who hadn't gone to that first swim meet.

The swim team people themselves didn't know what they had just walked into. No explanation was given, so they awkwardly left.

Tension bubbled around the table, mixing quite oddly with the echoes of Fergalicious overhead.

Instead of making a big thing about it, Marie and Feuilly didn't say anything. Slowly the dynamic came back to normal.

An hour or so into the dance, Grantaire's stomach started hurting. It wasn't bad enough for him to go home, just to go sit in a different area with stools that were more comfortable than the chairs at the main table.

Small groups, mainly Eponine, chatted with him while others went and danced in the area that was much too crowded and loud for his upset stomach. Cosette and Marius, ignoring their friends' teasings, went outside to enjoy the cool, quiet air and peaceful night time vibes.

Everything was going pretty well, but that soon changed once again.

The incident earlier really had annoyed Feuilly and Marie, so it was only a matter of time before that needed to actually be discussed. His and Bahorel's bickering about Hamilton gradually transformed to much less pleasant bickering about the swim team.

When she came back from Grantaire, Eponine and Montparnasse got into this whole bit about conducting a CIA investigation to figure out the identities of the gossipers. Marie didn't take it well.

She looked to Jehan, but they didn't know what to say, which side to pick. It was a tricky situation.

"Guys, why can't you let it go?" she said tiredly. "I don't understand the logic behind being mad at every single one of them when only two people were saying those things. They're our friends, I wish you could just give us the benefit of the doubt that it doesn't matter. And the whole thing happened more than a month ago anyway!"

Feuilly nodded emphatically, and this set off a slippery slope of annoyed reactions.

It was basically the same arguments from that day of the swim meet, repeated: the four of them took those comments personally because they were mean, and it would feel wrong to let that go so easily, even if it seems unlikely that they'll ever figure out who it was. Eventually the six of them grew tired of going back and forth on something that was apparently a much bigger deal than had seemed previously.

So they sulked and didn't talk about it, which probably wasn't a great solution.

As for everyone who was more-or-less neutral on the subject, it was difficult to know how to resolve this. Fights honestly didn't happen much in this group of friends, and on Homecoming of all nights, it was unprecedented.

Enjolras really wanted to come up with something, but his friends were being frustratingly unresponsive. Maybe it just wasn't the right time. He tapped a foot on the ground, making a decision.

This was supposed to be a good vibes night, so he was going to find some better vibes.

It was fortunate that Grantaire honestly didn't mind being alone with his thoughts, because none of his friends had come up to talk to him for several songs. He thought it was a little odd, but at least the lights were pretty where he was.

Never Gonna Give You Up had just started playing when he spotted Enjolras out of the corner of his eye, carrying two cans of some drink that might have been lemonade.

"Hey," said Enjolras, leaning on the counter/table thing. His hair looked messy and defiant, like it always did in history class during a particularly heated discussion. "Everyone's in sort of a funk back there, about what happened with the swim team. It's a bummer, but it didn't seem like anyone was going to try to resolve it, so I wanted to get away from all that."

"Oh. That stinks." So that explained everyone's absence.

Remembering the lemonade he was holding again, Enjolras laughed a little. "Just in case you were wondering, I'm not gonna drink both of these by myself like a weirdo," he joked, kind of awkwardly but still getting a laugh from Grantaire.

"Eponine told me your stomach was upset--I know ginger ale is usually the thing for that but, uh, yeah--this is for you."

He handed it to Grantaire, who said thanks. Both tried to put the little brush of their fingers out of their minds, because duh, that always happens when you hand someone something, obviously. Totally doesn't mean anything.

Enjolras sat down on a stool, and started talking about their friends' argument again.

He was obviously upset, and that wasn't good, so Grantaire tried to come up with a subject change. The music overhead gave him the perfect topic.

"They really play Never Gonna Give You Up every year," he said, shaking his head. "I can accept it as a meme, but why does it need to be Homecoming music?"

"I dunno, I kinda like it," Enjolras said, shrugging. "It's catchy."

This was too good. "You unironically like Never Gonna Give You Up?"

"I sort of thought it turned from just a meme into a classic song people actually liked." Not sure if he was right or not, Enjolras scratched the back of his neck. "Courfeyrac and Jehan unironically like it too, though."

"And since when do they have high standards for music?" Grantaire asked, both sarcastic and delighted. "90% of Jehan's music is cartoon theme songs and Courf's alarm is still the Gummy Bear Song!"

Both of them laughed at that--really laughed, like how it was with the library gnomes.

There was a spark in Enjolras' expression as he downed some lemonade and set his shoulders back. (Combeferre called this his argument mode.) "I'm telling him you disrespected the Gummy Bear Song. You can't stop me. He is going to be _so_ disappointed in you."

"Tell him then," Grantaire volleyed back, eyes bright. "I don't care."

After this, they enjoyed a while of comfortable silence, sipping lemonade and humming along to songs and just generally enjoying the vibe of the place. With a fond little smile, Enjolras watched Grantaire swing his legs back and forth under the stool, and with his own small smile, Grantaire watched Enjolras fiddle with the cuffs of his sleeves before finally giving up and leaving them uneven.

Grantaire did not dwell on the fact that they were sitting together, alone, at Homecoming; he instead focused on the lyrics of songs playing and on telling himself stupid distracting puns in his head. This mostly worked.

There were still no updates from their friends by the time each had finished the lemonade. Grantaire nudged Enjolras.

"I think the lemonade worked," he said, "or it was just a coincidence. My stomach's feeling better."

Enjolras sat up a little straighter. "Great! I don't know if everyone's back to normal yet or not, but do you wanna go check?"

Nodding, Grantaire folded his hands in his lap and glanced towards the crowds of people dancing. A Whitney Houston song was playing, and it looked really fun over there.

"Um… well actually, do you maybe wanna d--"

His question was interrupted by Musichetta, Joly, and Bossuet, who had just happened to run up to the two of them right then. "Hey guys! We have a plan to cheer everyone up, let's go!" she called.

"Awesome!" said Enjolras, already getting up from his stool. "You ready?"

Grantaire blinked a few times. "Yeah. For sure."

Unfortunately, none of the friends had taken an acting class during high school. (Marie did in freshman year, but she obviously wasn't part of the plan, so it didn't matter.) Joly assured everyone that it was fine, they could all act natural and say what they need to.

Feuilly and Marie still sat away from Eponine, Jehan, Bahorel, and Montparnasse, not happy about this situation but also not yet willing to be the ones to give in. The two of them were nice people who typically chose being reasonable over being petty--this was just different.

"What's been going on?" Grantaire asked his friends, pretending not to have been filled in.

Hands on his hips, Bossuet took a deep breath. "A terrible tragedy has occurred: six of our friends have gotten into a little fight. The Homecoming spirit has been dampened."

He got weird looks from everyone, because since when was this supposed to be Shakespearean?

At Joly's decisive head shake, Bossuet hastily revised what he had said. "Uh, I mean there was a fight about the swim team stuff, and now they're all upset." Seeing the opportunity for a little joke, he added, "Sorry, I got possessed by stupidity."

Montparnasse raised his head. "Well, when the water bottle incident happened, at least I wasn't like 'a terrible tragedy has occurred'."

This got a few laughs. Grantaire went on with the performance, making a big show of waving his arms around and gesturing to those involved in the swim team incident. "Are we really going to let this ruin Homecoming for us?" he asked dramatically. "We can't be in a bad mood for when they finally play the Cha Cha Slide!"

It was pretty obvious what they were doing at this point, but nobody stopped them because it was kinda funny.

Musichetta, trying extremely hard not to laugh, said, "Everyone should put their differences aside for the Cha Cha Slide." (Joly had insisted on the rhyme--Jehan appreciated it but Bahorel groaned.)

"If you put yourself in each other's shoes," said Enjolras slowly, needing to remember what he had to say, "you can… um… slide to the left and slide to the right, in terms of… relating to other people."

Absolute flabbergasted silence from the audience.

He looked pleadingly at Joly, who offered a sympathetic smile, and Grantaire, who was literally biting his tongue to keep from cracking up.

"And then," he finished miserably but loyally, "when you reach a compromise, you can… cha cha real smooth."

No group of fighting friends could have resisted bursting into laughter at this hilarious atrocity of an analogy, so when a tidal wave of laughs came bubbling up across the table, it was to be expected. Enjolras hung his head in shame, but at least it had had the intended effect.

By complete coincidence, the Cha Cha Slide came on at that exact moment. Obviously this moment of laughter didn't resolve everything; it mainly just relieved the tension. But before they all got up to go to the main dance area, Feuilly and Bahorel exchanged a little nod. The same happened between Marie, Eponine, Montparnasse, and Jehan.

A "we'll talk about it later" olive branch, which was much better than nothing.

Meanwhile, through this whole entire rollercoaster of ups and downs, Cosette and Marius were enjoying their alone time.

Not many people were outside in this part of the courtyard, so they could gaze up at the stars and loudly recite inaccurate lyrics to songs in private. It was a much needed moment of stress relief, a break from homework and everything for band at the Homecoming game last night.

Their favorite spot in the courtyard was this weirdly large ten foot tall chair that administrators sometimes sat in to keep an eye on students. Checking that nobody would spot them, they climbed it. There was an awesome view of the roads out past the school, even possibly to Cosette's house.

With a content sigh, Cosette laced her fingers with Marius'.

"This has probably been my favorite Homecoming out of all three," she told him. "You're my best friend, you know."

"Whoa, I passed Chetta?"

She reconsidered, laughing a little. "Well, maybe you guys are tied, but you get what I mean."

"Yeah." Marius took a moment to brush a few strands of hair out of her face and kiss her on the forehead. They smiled at each other, and she kissed him, feeling warm and excited and safe. "I do."

**Author's Note:**

> hope you liked it!!


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